Farmers begin wheat harvest despite this year's challenges

BLADEN, Neb. — Severe weather and floods in Nebraska have caused a lot of delays for farmers across the state, but now that we've had some dry spells, farmers are finally able to start harvesting their wheat.

Despite battling everything from flooding to severe weather this season farmers are getting ready to harvest their wheat with an open mindset.

"All winter long, it looked pretty tough," said farmer Daren Niemeyer. "I was pretty nervous about it."

If you'd have asked farmers in southern Nebraska earlier this year on whether they'd have a good yield for their wheat crop this season, they likely would have shared the same answer.

"You know I would have wondered if we were even going to cut any wheat," said Niemeyer.

However as harvest season approached and weather cooperated enough for Ag producers to get to into their fields, some were pleasantly surprised.

"Hindsight's twenty–twenty," said Niemeyer. " We should have went full bore on everything and the wheat, I think would have been a little better even what it is."

Farmer Daren Niemeyer began cutting wheat earlier this week and although there's some good crop in his field, he said a late harvest is providing a number of challenges.

"Acreage wise, we're a little bit down from where we normally are," said Niemeyer. "But, the yields are definitely better than they were last year," he said.

According to the USDA, Nebraska's winter wheat production is foretasted to bring 51.4 million bushels of grain by the end of the season.

However, the number of fields being harvested is down four percent from a year ago.

Farmers said with current prices there is almost no incentive to grow wheat anymore.

"The United States doesn't raise as much wheat worldwide as we used to," said Niemeyer. "It's such a world commodity that it depends on everybody else's crops all the way around the world."

So, Niemeyer made some adjustments this year to make due.

"We've cut back on some acres of wheat already ," he said. " Farm wide, I think we would think that we'd probably be cutting back on a few more acres."

Although it's likely there won't be much profit as he'd hoped to get this year, Niemeyer said after the weird weather they've seen he's grateful for the wheat that did yield this season.

"We're happy with what the yields that we're getting right now," said Niemeyer. " If we can just get this out before another storm come's that's the main thing."