Rippey Has Concerns About Winter Wheat Crop

Ask USDA meteorologist Brad Rippey, and he'll tell you there are some concerns when it comes to the winter wheat crop. He said according to the latest numbers, 43% of the crop rated good to excellent, 21% very poor to poor.

"That's actually a bit of a drop from last week's numbers when we saw 46% good to excellent and just 18% very poor to poor," Rippey noted. "And of course these numbers are lowers than last year's at this time when we had 52% of the crop good to excellent and just 14% very poor to poor."

Meanwhile, Rippey noted emergence is quite good.

"We've had just enough moisture even in some of the drier areas to at least allow for emergence. But we'd like to see some more moisture in a lot of areas including the Northwest, the Central and Southern High Plains, and even parts of the Midwest, to allow the crop to further develop before full dormancy is achieved."

Nationally, 89% of the winter wheat has emerged.  

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