Farmers Report Good to Excellent Tobacco Crop

Source from:  By Walt Reichert/Sentinel-News Editor 09/14/2006

Some farmers across the state are reporting difficulty finding workers to cut and house a tobacco crop they say is mostly good-to-excellent this year. According to the Kentucky Agricultural Statistics Service, 56 percent of farmers rate their crops good, while another 26 percent rate their crops excellent. Only 1 percent of farmers rate their crop very poor. Locally, some farmers got a late start planting tobacco but most report good to excellent crops as adequate rains in most of the county nourished burley this year. Partly because of the worker situation, farmers are slightly behind in getting the crop in the barn this year. KASS reports 65 percent of the burley crop had been cut by Sept. 10, which is behind the average of 70 percent last year and the five-year average of 69 percent. Housed tobacco continued to cure well with adequate humidity to bring it in and out of case. The corn harvest also got under way across the state last week. Farmers report harvest acreage at 18 percent, behind the five-year average of 23 percent. KASS estimates that about 75 percent of the state's corn crop has matured. Soybean farmers across the state rated their crop mostly good (48 percent) or excellent (35 percent). Farmers are expecting excellent soybean yields. As of Sept. 10, 35 percent of soybeans had started turning yellow. Enditem