Get Your Wheat Seed Order in Early

Local cash and futures prices topping $6.10 and $7.00 per bushel, respectively coupled with the strong likelihood of early corn and soybean harvest have many growers considering winter wheat in 2010. Seed availability of elite varieties will begin to tighten so it is imperative to get your seed orders in early. To date, all of the wheat seed samples that have come into the Wisconsin Crop Improvement Association have been blue tag certified (>85% germ). This is good news to growers as certain areas of the state had difficulties with harvest and sprouting. It is still premature however to fully know the total amount of certified wheat seed from the 2010 crop available for planting in 2010. I strongly caution growers from planting bin run seed in 2010 given the sprouting issues and low test weights, both of which can negatively impact germination, tillering, and overwintering.