Darren Frye did some field touring over the weekend, stopping at 10 locations in central Illinois to take a close look at the crops. His overall assessment is that the crop is underdeveloped and needs about 25 - 30 more days to reach maturity. He says soybean pod counts are less than normal for this time of year. Here are the numbers from the fields he checked.
Corn Bean Pods/Plant
South of Bloomington 164.8 43.0
Wapella 203.6 14.2
South of Maroa 186.0 32.4
South of Decatur 175.0 34.2
North of Pana 154.4 25.0
East of Shelbyville 147.5 15.8
Arcola 136.5 28.0
Tuscola 214.7 25.2
Rantoul 159.7 38.6
Downs 202.3 16.2
Average 174.4 27.3