Weather risk plays a unique role and influences many decisions made on the farm. Weather determines when you can get into the field and your ability to perform timely operations such as planting, fertilizing, spraying, and harvesting. Delays from weather events of time-sensitive operations will result in substantial yield and economic losses. To mitigate such losses, appropriately sized farm machinery is one strategy to manage weather risk. However, there are economic tradeoffs between owning and operating larger machinery to avoid yield loss due to weather-related events. The first step in evaluating these tradeoffs is determining the number of days suitable for fieldwork. The sole purpose of this publication is to establish the required data (days suitable for fieldwork) for optimizing the sizing of farm machinery for Kentucky producers.

The time necessary to complete the task depends on whether or not the equipment can operate given field conditions (i.e. suitable for fieldwork). For example, planting row crops in the spring can be hindered by snow, frost, and rainfall events that delay planting, resulting in yield loss. Research shows that approximately 0.50% yield loss occurs in soybeans each day after the optimal planting date of early May in Western Kentucky and mid-May in Central Kentucky for group IV varieties. Similarly, group II soybean varieties experience a 0.42% yield loss per day after the optimal planting date of mid-April in Western Kentucky and late April in Central Kentucky (AGR-130). Therefore, having an expectation of the number of days suitable for fieldwork will allow producers to size farm machinery to mitigate such yield losses appropriately.

Author(s) Contact Information: 

Jordan Shockley | jordan.shockley@uky.edu

Tyler Mark | tyler.mark@uky.edu