From KS Wheat
This is day 10 of the Kansas Wheat Harvest Reports, brought to you by the Kansas Wheat Commission, Kansas Association of Wheat Growers, Kansas Grain and Feed Association and the Kansas Cooperative Council.
Temperatures continue to rise as a heat advisory is issued for much of central, south-central and southeast Kansas, allowing for harvest to continue for the time being. However, a chance of rain later this week could cause another pause this harvest season.
Clay Schemm, a farmer in Wallace and Logan counties, reported taking their first load on June 18. Schemm reports having a wide range of test weights, with one of the highest being 62 lb; he also said that he had a load this morning with a protein level of 15.4 percent.
“I’d say we’re probably two-thirds to three quarters of the way done, definitely on the back half of harvest. For others in the area, I estimate they're a little over halfway done,” said Schemm. “It’s been an interesting year out here; last week we had a huge amount of rain so we hardly got any harvesting done in the area. This week we’ve been going and people are plugging through it.”
Schemm states that producers in his area are wrapping up with harvest this week, while others haven’t even started because of weather delays.
“I was talking with people at the elevators and according to them, they’ve had farmers coming through saying they’re about to finish up, and in the same breath they’ve got farmers that they haven’t seen bring any loads in and they know those farmers have wheat out there ready to be harvested.”
When speaking on how drought challenges have affected the area, Schemm says it has been a highly variable harvest season.
“The biggest thing we’ve seen out in this area this year is that it has been hit or miss,” said Schemm. “There are some fields that aren't coming in terribly, with one field averaging about 32 (bushels), even in a hard drought area. But then you have other fields that are so stricken with drought that guys aren’t even cutting them.”
Cienna DeLeon, with Central Valley Ag in Jewell County, took in their first load of wheat on June 10 and reported that they are 85 percent done with harvest. In the area, they were stopped for a week due to rain but started back strong yesterday (June 29).
“The yields are down and people are frustrated,” said DeLeon. “This year has been significantly below average, but the wheat we are taking in is pretty fair quality.”
Along with the weather delays, DeLeon noted the oncoming weed pressure and the race to get wheat out of the field. They expect to be finished with harvest by the end of the week.
Doug Keesling, a farmer in Rice county reported taking in their first load on June 4, then finishing up along with most farmers in their area before the rain on June 19. He noted that the biggest challenge he continually faced was drought.
“We had no time to slow down during harvest because of the rain,” said Keesling. “Harvest should've been earlier than what it was, but then we had dreary cold days. Without them, harvest would've been a week earlier. I don't really care when harvest is, the wheat tells us when the harvest is,” said Keesling.
The 2026 Harvest Report is brought to you by the Kansas Wheat Commission, Kansas Association of Wheat Growers, Kansas Grain and Feed Association, and the Kansas Cooperative Council. To follow along with harvest updates on X, use #wheatharvest26. Tag us at @kansaswheat on Facebook, Instagram and X to share your harvest story and photos.
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Written by Shelby Priddle, assistant director of communications, Kansas Wheat