A Washington grower captured the National Wheat Foundation’s Bin-Buster award after harvesting a wheat crop that was 216.15 percent above the county average. Growing irrigated hard red winter wheat variety Keldin from WestBred, Phillip Gross from Warden, Washington had the top yield nationally with 192.85 bushels per acre.
Gross joins 13 other National Wheat Yield Contest winners that boasted a yield average of 135 bushels per acre, far surpassing their county averages. The growers were split into two categories and two subcategories, Winter Wheat (Dryland and Irrigated) and Spring Wheat (Dryland and Irrigated).
The top yielding dryland winter wheat winner was Rick Horton, Leoti, Kansas, whose variety, Joe, a white wheat from the Kansas Wheat Alliance, yielded 127.94 bushels per acre, 373.85 percent above the county average.
The top yielding irrigated winter wheat was WestBred’s hard red winter wheat variety Grainfield, planted by Jagger Borth of Plains, Kansas, who achieved a yield of 133.64 bushels per acre, 377.29 percent above the county average.
The dryland spring wheat winner was Kent Pfaff of Washburn, North Dakota, who planted Croplan’s hard red spring variety 3530. He reached a yield of 104.29 bushels per acre, 126.72 percent over the county average.
Dan Mills of Stanfield, Oregon, was the top yielder in the irrigated spring wheat category. His hard red spring variety Solano from WestBred yielded 146.5 bushels per acre, 112.32 percent above his county average.
The 2016 winners will be recognized at the 2017 Commodity Classic in San Antonio, Texas, as guests of the National Wheat Foundation. For a full list of the national and state winners, check out the National Wheat Foundation web site.
“The Foundation believes that the National Wheat Yield Contest will be the catalyst to driving innovation among growers, and communication with competitors and colleagues to facilitate productive discourse on successful practices and techniques,” says NWF Chairman Phil McLain.
The sponsorship of the Yield Contest by Monsanto, BASF, John Deere, and Winfield provided growers with the tools, products, and management techniques to produce excellent yields and encourage the transfer of knowledge from industry experts to growers.
The 2017 National Wheat Yield Contest is now open. Registration for the fall wheat sector will end May 1, 2017, and registration for the spring wheat sector will end August 1, 2017.
