Originally published September 24, 2024. Week 2 of the Iowa corn harvest has registered a 3% weekly output increase,  even as a new short corn breed readies to occupy a drying corn belt. 

Concerning the harvest progress, Iowa’s Secretary of Agriculture Mike Naig describes the fall crop as ready in most of the state.

Responding to a U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA)’s positive report on the progress, Naig said that the reaping is “ramping up” statewide.

Despite slowing the progress a bit, a spurt of weekend rain has brought hopes for late-maturing October corn. The rainfall was nevertheless an inch or so across most of the state and below average for September. 

By week 2 of the harvest, the maturity degree of corn in the state was 93%. This percentage tallies with the five-year median or slightly above it for this particular timing. 

This is happy news given that there has been extreme heat in the 2024 summer throughout the cropland. The Osceola township in south central Iowa, for instance, at one time recorded 94º F or 10.6º F above par.

A Drought.gov report of September 24, 2024 showed moderate drought and abnormal dryness in 4% and 95.6% of Iowa, respectively.

Short Corn a Game Changer

Talking of drought,  the corn belt could soon be visible for miles courtesy a new short corn breed by Bayer Crop Science.

Unlike today’s 12-feet high cornstalks that obscure the horizon, the short variety will bring visibility at just 7 feet.

It will not only expand the scenic prairies of the Midwest but will withstand weather forces such as storms. Its sturdy short stature will make it resistant to winds of 50 miles per hour, a quality that helicopter surveys have revealed. 

This reminds of the 2020 windstorm that lashed through Iowa at 100 mph, destroying crops and felling trees. 

Crop developer, Bayer Crop Science has already tested the new breed on 30,000  acres across the Midwest.

Ultimately, while focus is on the ongoing Iowa corn harvest, the future promise of short stature corn is also noteworthy. And as the following statistics show, corn is what makes Iowa the “food basket of the world.” 

Iowa Corn Statistics

Iowa, a state in the northern U.S., is a leading corn production hub and its grain exports make it a world food basket. Corn has been the state’s main crop for 150 years. In 2022, Iowa produced 2.511 billion bushels of corn, according to the National Agricultural Statistics Service (NASS). A year later in 2023, corn production again exceeded the 2.5 billion-bushel mark. Closing in on this federal production lead was Illinois at 2.3 billion bushels and Nebraska at 1.7 billion bushels.

What are the main varieties of corn in Iowa?

Iowa grows many of the 1,000 name varieties or brands of corn that the U.S. has grown since 1840. “Dent corn,” or field corn that forms a kernel dent when dry is the most common and has 23 cultivars. The most common cultivar is Reid’s Yellow Dent. Only 1% of this corn serves as fresh sweet corn on the cob for 99% is dried for processing uses. 

Which districts of Iowa yield most corn per acre? 

Data by the Iowa State University shows some districts across Iowa average over 200 bushels per acre. Two of these are Sioux and Cherokee in Northwest Iowa, whose 2014-2023 corn yield averages were 205.7 and 203.9 bushels per acre, respectively. Topping them were Jasper in the Central part, at 209 bushels an acre and Dubuque in the Northeast at 207.4 bushels.

What are the main uses of corn in Iowa? 

According to the Iowa Farm Bureau,much of Iowa’s corn goes into ethanol processing and animal feed. For instance in 2021, 15 million tonnes of a production total of 64.5 million tonnes went into feed. While hogs gobbled up 62% of this, cattle claimed 20% of the remainder. The biggest margin, however, channeled into the burgeoning ethanol sector, which took up 60.6% of the state’s corn