OLATHE, KAN. — Industry leaders reviewed the 2024 US winter wheat crop, presented 2025 updates by state and elected a technical board for 2025 during the winter wheat portion of the Wheat Quality Council’s annual meeting in late February.  

Members voted to elect Gang Guo, director of wheat research and quality at Ardent Mills, as the chairman of the 2025 Hard Winter Wheat Technical Board. The group elected Kevin Kloberdanz, quality systems manager with Grain Craft, as vice chairman, and Scott Baker, principal quality specialist at Bay State Milling as board secretary. Two industry veterans were elected members of the board: Rhett Kaufman, a food technologist with the Agricultural Research Service of the US Department of Agriculture; and Josh Reasoner, a technical service manager with 26 years of experience in food science and technology.

Royce Schaneman, executive director of the Nebraska Wheat Board, summarized the 2024 hard winter wheat crop quality, which was analyzed via 575 samples representing 98% of the crop. The hard winter wheat crop assessment was given by export region.

For wheat grown in the central and southern Plains, some of which is exported through the Gulf of America, average test weights exceeded the five-year average while wheat protein levels were slightly lower versus the previous two drought-stressed crops, he said, but the crop generated a wider range of proteins for buyers. Falling numbers were very good.  

Hard winter wheat grown in the Pacific Northwest export region, including the northern Plains, had an average quality grade of No. 1, higher test weights versus the previous year, “good, dense kernels and, a big selling point, falling numbers were very strong,” Schaneman said.

Reports from the primary hard red winter wheat production states were issued, beginning with a report on Texas from Jackie Rudd, professor of wheat breeding and genetics at Texas A&M University.

In Texas, 5.8 million acres were seeded to wheat last fall, up from 5.5 million in 2023, but down from 6.4 million in the fall of 2022 and 6 million as the recent 10-year average, Rudd said.

“A lot of those acres are for grazing and for forage and for silage,” he said. “It’s different from year to year, but the forage need and especially the silage need has really increased the acreage. Grain may or may not be the same. Generally, about 50% of wheat in Texas is never harvested, either because of heat or drought, but some of it is grazing.”

Texas wheat conditions were better than in recent years, he said, owing partly to rainfall amounts up to 14 inches in the Texas panhandle and some snowfall in early to mid-January. The state’s wheat areas also had recorded numerous below-freezing-temperature days this year. There was no freeze damage concern as the plants were still vegetating and not yet jointed, he said.

Oklahoma’s planted wheat acreage for harvest in 2025 was 4.25 million acres, down 2% from 4.35 million acres seeded the previous year. Mike Schulte of the Oklahoma Wheat Commission, absent due to weather, prepared a report issued by Aaron Harries of Kansas Wheat. He said the 2025 Oklahoma crop is 55% poor to fair (“extremely high for that category that early in the season,” Schulte said), 37% good and 3% excellent. Oklahoma wheat fields, which are extremely dry, were mostly seeded in November-December, thus are about a month to a month and a half behind the typical growth pace.

“If it was planted earlier in the season, most of that was dusted in and later heavy rains made the stands in those fields extremely poor,” Schulte’s report said. “Later-planted wheat has been stressed due to extreme conditions, extreme cold, wider-than-normal anticipated temperature swings, wind chills of minus-20 to minus-10 degrees with a return to 60-degree temperatures predicted for late February without much precipitation forecast. Most producers have held off on fertilizer applications in hope of receiving rain. We have reason to be concerned about the crop being so far behind along with the large temperature variance and lack of moisture. If we do get a warm, early spring, we could potentially predict to see a major yield loss in this crop this coming year.”

About 39% of the Oklahoma winter wheat crop is being grazed with cattle, “but in many years that number is 55% to 60%,” Harries said.

Across the border in Kansas, conditions “change pretty dramatically, and our picture is a little more optimistic than they have in Oklahoma,” Harries said.

The USDA estimated Kansas farmers seeded 4 million acres to wheat. The Department’s latest crop conditions report on Feb. 2 rated Kansas wheat 50% good-to-excellent and 14% poor to very poor, similar to year-ago ratings. Drought conditions have improved dramatically in the state, and widespread rainfall last fall, including record-high amounts in some areas, account for the difference in conditions with Oklahoma wheat.  

Most of central and eastern Kansas had 24 days of an inch or more snow cover following a Jan. 5 blizzard, “which is quite unusual,” Harries said. Following a second major snow event in February, those regions had two inches of snow cover as temperatures plummeted well below zero again.  Soil temperatures at a two-inch depth, considered a danger zone for winterkill of wheat, measured 28° or higher in mid-February. However, southwest and parts of west-central Kansas were susceptible to winterkill for lack of snow cover.

In that part of the state, “there is some wheat that this fall had jointed and went well beyond that in some cases,” he said. “Wheat that wasn’t grazed was well head of schedule. There’s certainly going to be some damage to those wheat fields, but it all depends upon the spring, how the weather is. A crop can rebound from that, but it’s a concern for areas without snow cover and the snow is light and fluffy, not much moisture in it, and how much stays on or blows off the wheat certainly makes a difference, too.”

Schaneman said Nebraska wheat in storage totaled 53.9 million bus, up 31% from a year earlier, including 9 million bus on farms. Nebraska farmers last fall mostly seeded in extremely dry conditions. Those who waited and planted late did so with slightly more rainfall. The state experienced a mostly dry winter until February, when light, fluffy snow arrived.

“Without good moisture at planting, stands were not good and are going to be susceptible, but hopefully the snow will get us through without much damage,” he said.

Nebraska wheat conditions were mostly good to fair as of early February and soil moisture was mostly adequate to short.

Brad Erker, executive director of Colorado Wheat, said 2.1 million acres were seeded to winter wheat in the state last fall. The latest crop condition assessment pegged that crop at 67% good-to-excellent, similar to a year earlier.

“We’re optimistic in the winter of where our crop is right now,” he said. “A lot of that is due to a big, one-off, random snow event in early November where some areas got four feet of snow. One of our board members had to use snowshoes to go clear off a solar panel for his water for cattle. It wasn’t everywhere, kind of along the Interstate 70 corridor. So a lot of growers feel pretty good getting that subsoil moisture built up quite a bit. If we get some spring rains, we have a good chance of getting back to an average crop.”

A Montana update was presented by Max Cederberg, district 2 director with Montana Wheat & Barley. For 2025, Montana farmers seeded 2.2 million acres to winter wheat, up 300,000 acres, or 15%, from last year. Conditions this month were slightly behind a year earlier and the recent five-year average at 52% fair and 41% good-to-excellent.

Dave Green, executive vice president of the WQC, concluded the winter wheat meeting with an organizational update. He said membership and dues were stable and that the board was closely monitoring changes in the federal government and how they might affect the Council and its operations. MBN

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