May 19, 2023
Welcome to the first Harvest Report for the 2023/24 U.S. wheat crop. The 2023 Hard Red Winter Wheat Tour hosted by the Wheat Quality Council wrapped up this week; for updates about the crop in Kansas, southern Nebraska and northern Oklahoma, follow #wheattour23 on Twitter. HRW harvest is off to a slow start in Texas due to rain delays. Further north, rains have delayed spring wheat planting in North Dakota and Minnesota, but farmers are making steady progress.
This Week’s #WheatHarvest23 Round-Up
Follow #WheatHarvest23 on social media for daily coverage throughout the U.S. wheat harvest season.
Farmers in South Texas began the 2023 wheat harvest earlier this month. The state’s harvest is typically completed by the beginning of July. According to the National Agricultural Statistics Service (NASS), the first estimate for Texas winter wheat production is 56 million bushels, averaging 28 bushels per acre on 2 million acres.
A scene from the 2022 wheat harvest in Oklahoma. Estimates presented at Oklahoma Grain and Feed Association’s annual meeting last week in Oklahoma City point to statewide production of 40.7 million bushels, an all-time low. Wheat harvest in Oklahoma typically begins around Memorial Day and is usually complete by the first week of July.
Skills in the hills. This scene from a past harvest in Lamont, Washington, combine operator Amund Melville and truck driver Jacob Swannack adjust to successfully unload the hopper. Wheat harvest in Washington typically begins in early July and is complete by September. (Photo by Michelle Ringwood)
A scene from the 2022 durum harvest in Arizona. Arizona’s Desert Durum wheat harvest typically begins in early May and is complete by mid-July.
An Ohio farmer during an early July harvest. According to NASS, winter wheat seedings in the Buckeye State were up 27% compared to 2022. That’s 140,000 more acres planted in wheat, for a total of about 650,000.
