JEFFERSON CITY, Mo. (DTN) -- After years of placing nationally but falling short of earning top honors, Dallin Wilcox, a farmer from Rexburg, Idaho, took the title of "Bin Buster" in the irrigated spring wheat category of the 2023 National Wheat Yield Contest. His winning yield of 170.14 bushels per acre (bpa) topped all 13 entries in the category this year.
Entering the contest is an annual tradition for the Wilcox family. Dallin farms with his father and uncles in southeastern Idaho where in addition to growing wheat, potatoes, barley and alfalfa, they run a cow-calf operation.
"My uncle, Terry, has entered since the beginning and has placed first or second a few times. He was the Bin Buster in 2020," Dallin said. "He talked me into entering, and I've been doing it since 2017. It's fun to see how well your crops can perform."
Now in its eighth year, the yield contest organized by the National Wheat Foundation (NWF) is designed to encourage wheat growers to strive for high yield, quality and profit while trying new and innovative management strategies. DTN/Progressive Farmer is the official media outlet of the competition.
Wilcox planted WestBred WB7589, a hard white spring wheat variety the seed company describes as being adapted for irrigated environments with excellent yield potential, protein content and stripe rust tolerance. The medium-maturing variety also has excellent standability, test weight and milling and baking quality.
This marked the third consecutive year that Wilcox placed nationally with the variety. In 2021, he finished second with a yield of 147.65 bpa, improving to first place with a yield of 160.63 bpa last year before finally achieving the Bin Buster title this year. The Bin Buster award goes to the entry with the highest bushel-per-acre yield from each high yield basis category.
"We'd placed a few times in the past with WestBred's WB9668, which is a hard red variety that we still grow," he said. "But, after comparing the hard red to the hard white in some on-farm yield trials, we decided to go with WB7589. It's a little cheaper to grow it, and it has performed really well."
LATE SPRING
This year, winter didn't want to release its grip on Idaho, Wilcox said, delaying the start of the new growing season.
"The snow just wouldn't melt, so we had a really late spring," he added. "It meant we had good soil moisture to start, but we were at least three weeks later than usual getting in the field."
The field containing Wilcox's yield contest plot was planted on May 5 using a Great Plains 3S-4000 drill. The field was planted at a rate of about 1.43 million seeds per acre on 6-inch row spacing. The seed was coated with CruiserMaxx Vibrance, which combines four active ingredients including three fungicides and one insecticide.
Because the Wilcox family also raises potatoes with a high nutrient demand, they work hard to maintain soil fertility throughout their crop rotation. The wheat crop followed potatoes, allowing it to mine any leftover fertility in the soil profile. Nitrogen, phosphorus, potassium, and sulfur were all applied pre-plant. Additional nitrogen was applied as starter fertilizer at planting and during irrigation.
Here in this portion of Snake River Plain, irrigation is essential for crop production as total annual precipitation averages less than 13 inches per year. Throughout the growing season, Wilcox applied 10 inches of water to his wheat crop.
While the growing season may have been delayed, the conditions throughout the summer remained nearly ideal for wheat production, Wilcox said. Pest and disease issues never materialized, allowing him to limit his herbicide and fungicide application to just one pass at around the flag leaf stage.
"Overall, our temperatures were cooler this year, which really helped the wheat," Wilcox noted. "Last year, we went a month straight with highs in the 90s, which is not normal here. This year, we hardly hit much in the 90s and definitely nothing in the 100s."
Probably the greatest hurdle this year was harvest, Wilcox said. After the dry summer, rains came just as the crop reached maturity. It caused some lodging to occur and slowed their ability to bring in the crop, which was harvested on Sept. 7.
Even with a yield of 170.14 bpa, Wilcox said the hard white spring wheat maintained good quality, with a protein level just over 13%. While he's been pleased with WB7589, he said he'll be reviewing the results of their on-farm test plots to see if a new variety might have outperformed it.
"We're always looking to improve," Wilcox said. "If there's some seed available with a variety that I think will do better, whether it's hard red or hard white, I'll plant a field and give it a try."
Overall, the average yield of the national winners in this year's irrigated spring wheat category was 147.99 bpa. Wilcox will join the other contest winners at a reception hosted by the National Wheat Foundation during the 2024 Commodity Classic in Houston. He said that when he attended the event previously, he always took away something that allows him to improve his operation.
"Not everyone has potatoes in their rotation, so when you go to Commodity Classic, it's just fun to learn how other wheat growers do things in other parts of the country and then compare it to what we do in Idaho," Wilcox said. "It's also pretty rewarding to know that all your hard work throughout the season has paid off."
Winners in the 2023 National Wheat Yield Contest Spring Wheat - Irrigated Category include:
-- Bin Buster: Dallin Wilcox
Rexburg, Idaho
Variety: WestBred WB7589
Yield: 170.14 bpa
-- First Place: Jess Blatchford
Haines, Oregon
Variety: WestBred WB6341
Yield: 164.5 bpa
-- Second Place: Jeff Bieber
Fairview, Montana
Variety: WestBred WB9719
Yield: 109.33 bpa
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Meet the Winter Wheat - Dryland Category winner here: https://www.dtnpf.com/…
Meet the Spring Wheat - Dryland Category winner here: https://www.dtnpf.com/…
More on this year's yield contest can be found here: https://www.dtnpf.com/…
For more information on the yield contest and to view past winners, go to: https://yieldcontest.wheatfoundation.org/…
Jason Jenkins can be reached at jason.jenkins@dtn.com
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