I realize that when it comes to the weather we’re all about instant gratification, but I’m beginning to wonder about this global warming thing. I can’t remember the last time the high for the day hit 80F, and it might be a while before it hits 80 again. We’ve had far too many days with highs in the 70s and lows in the 50s, and that sure isn’t corn-growing weather. It’s been abnormally cool almost since corn went into the ground in May. “Knee high by the 4th of July” used to be the goal, but earlier planting combined with much more cold-tolerant corn hybrids resulted in a new goal of waist high or above. I sure didn’t see much knee-high corn this July 4th weekend…
I can see it coming: Unless we have a really warm next six weeks or so (through August), there will be a lot of very immature corn ensiled in September. Because for some reason too many farmers pay more attention to the calendar than to the stage of maturity of their corn crop when deciding when to harvest. I remember many years ago two farming brothers in Chazy with whom I was working closely casually mentioned that they were going to start chopping corn the following week. I did a double take, because it was late August. Why were they going to start on September 1st (or thereabouts)? Because that’s when Dad always started. And why did he start then? This question drew blank stares–they didn’t know why, he just did. We finally discovered the reason: Dad always started then because the boys helped fill silo, and he wanted to be done by Labor Day since right after that the boys were back in school and he lost his free labor. For him, ”Labor Day” had a special (and somewhat different) meaning. After learning that I was able to convince them not to start until I told them to, and starting that year for the first time in memory there wasn’t a stream of silage effluent running from their tower silos.