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Hall County corn producers had another good year in 2007 as farmers harvested a record 37.5 million bushels.
That was an increase from 2006's record of 36 million bushels.
But with record production also came above-average prices. According to the Nebraska Field Office of the U.S. Department of Agriculture's National Agricultural Statistics Service, the average corn price for Nebraska last year was $4 per bushel, compared with $3 per bushel in 2006.
That would put the value of Hall County's corn crop at more than $150 million, compared to 2006's corn value of more than $108 million.
Hall County farmers planted 203,000 acres last year, an increase of 12,000 acres from 2006, according to the Agricultural Statistics Service.
According to figures posted at the Nebraska Field Office of the National Agricultural Statistics Service's Web site at www.nass.usda.gov, farmers in Hall County planted 203,000 corn acres and harvested 201,100 acres. The average yield was 186.3 bushels per acre for a total production of 37.5 million bushels.
USDA records show the most acres of corn ever planted in Hall County was 214,000 in 1997. The average yield then was 140.9 bushels per acre, with a total production of 29.7 million acres.
Hall County's increase in corn planting reflected a statewide trend that saw 9.4 million acres of corn planted.
Last year's yield was similar to 2006's yield of 186.2 bushels per acre. Hall County's best corn yield was in 2004 at 198.5 bushels per acre.
The number of corn acres planted for all purposes last year, 203,000 acres, was a 14,000-acre increase from 2006. The previous high for acres planted for all purposes this decade was in 2000, when 195,000 acres were planted.
Corn planted on irrigated ground in Hall County last year was at 191,000 acres, with 189,500 acres harvested. The average yield was 190 bushels, for a total production of 36 million bushels.
What pushed Hall County's record corn yield higher was dryland acres, which averaged a record 126 bushels per acre for a total production of 1.46 million bushels.
Helping out the dryland yield was above-normal rainfall. Twenty-six inches of rain fell in Hall County during the first five months of the growing season.
The average Hall County dryland yield for the seven years before 2007 was 64 bushels per acre.
While corn production was at a record level, planted soybean acres fell to a decade low of 19,000 acres, which was down 24,000 acres from 2006. The number of soybean acres harvested was 18,900, with an average yield of 58.7 bushels per acre for a total production of 1.1 million bushels. The total was down about 1.5 million bushels from the previous year.
The average yield (both dryland and irrigated) was a record, thanks to a productive dryland soybean yield of 50 bushels per acre. By comparison, in the previous seven years, dryland soybeans in Hall County averaged 25.4 bushels per acre.
The average yield on irrigated soybean acres was 60 bushels per acre last year. That was one bushel less than the record yield in Hall County set in 2005 and 2006.
Despite an average statewide soybean price of $9.95 per bushel, up $3 per bushel from 2006, the value of Hall County's soybean crop was down $4 million. The value dropped from $15.1 million in 2006 to $11 million last year because of the fewer soybean acres planted and harvested.
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