What’s Really Causing the Tight Tassel Wrap Pollination Problems This Year?

The view of the corn crop from the road this year looks good. Fields have lush green corn plants and even stands, which is why farmers had high hopes for bin-busting yields.

But as farmers wade into their fields and pull back the husks, some are finding an unpleasant surprise: an issue with overly tight wrapped tassels.

“It’s a very unique phenomenon we’re dealing with, and a lot of these issues have come from tassel wrapping,” says Dan Quinn, Extension corn specialist for Purdue University.

Quinn started seeing the pollination problem in some of his own fields, and once he took a closer, he says it was quick to diagnose if you caught the field at the right time.

“It’s just a function of these tassels being almost stuck in the upper leaves,” he explains. “We’re seeing those upper leaves tightly wrap around the tassel, and in many cases it’s delaying the tassel emergence.”

He says that delay from the overly tight tassels is throwing off the synchronization of pollination at a critical time, and now it’s showing up in the form of poorly pollinated ears.

“The big thing with corn is we talk about the synchrony between pollen drop and the silk emergence,” Quinn says. “[Pollination] a very fairly short window in corn. Anything that throws out that timing can cause issues with pollination.”

What’s catching so many farmers by surprise is the fact crop conditions look phenomenal across many areas of the country this year thanks to good planting conditions and timely rains. In fact, USDA’s latest Crop Progress report shows nearly three-quarters of the nation’s corn crop is rated in good to excellent condition.

“You have to get in there and peel back the husks,” Quinn says. “You have to take a look at kernel development. Another thing we often look at is when silks, or the ovules on the kernel, are fertilized. When that occurs, the silks will detach. If you carefully pull back the husk, you have to be careful, and you can actually shake the ear to see which silks fall off or which ones actually stay attached.”

Pollination Problems in Iowa

Mark Licht, an Extension cropping systems specialist at Iowa State University, first started seeing corn pollination issues in early July.

“Some of those first tasseling fields were where this really started to show up,” Licht says. “I think that’s attributed to some of the characteristics around what’s causing it, and it kept going until probably about a week ago is when we kind of stopped seeing it in the field. But then, of course, farmers that had noticed the pollination issues, and that’s when, they were still getting agronomists, myself and others out to look at their fields.”

He says the tight tassel wrap usually lasts around three to five days and is noticeable in fields during that time. But it’s a short window that growers can see the tassel tight tassel wrap in their fields. And when it grows out of it, and the tassel blossoms out like normal.

That means if farmers didn’t notice the tight tassel in that short three to five day window, they might not even know pollination problems exist in their field until they actually walk into the field and check ears to see how the corn pollinated.

“If it unwrapped quickly, we might only see a dozen or two dozen kernels that were not pollinating,” Licht says. “Some of them that stayed wrapped up a little bit tighter, longer, we might see 25% to a third of that ear didn’t pollinate well.”

What’s the Worst-Case Scenario in Iowa?

For Licht, he has seen fields where eight out of 10 ears had issues.

“One of the fields that I was in, it was about 80% of the ears, and it was probably in that 25% of the ear with poor pollination,” he says. “So, this pollination issues [from tight tassel wrap] could be somewhat significant. That’s a worst-case scenario. Most of this is on the fields with pollination issues that I’ve seen are on the lighter side of things where it may only be a dozen kernels or so impacted on an ear, and it might only be 20% of ears impacted.”

At Least 10 States Are Reporting Pollination Problems From Overly Tight Wrapped Tassels

Licht says the problem is widespread, but in Iowa, it appears to be primarily isolated to the central and southeast portions of the state. He’s also heard reports of tight tassel wrap impacting pollination in Minnesota, South Dakota, Nebraska, Tennessee, Illinois and Indiana.

Add those seven states with reports of the problem in Missouri, Kansas and Ohio, and the total grows to 10 states seeing pollination issues this year.

What’s Really Causing the Tight Tassel Wrap Pollination Problems This Year?

Plants experience tight tassel wrap each year, according to Licht, but he says the crop typically grows out of it before pollination. This year, the leaves stayed tightly wrapped around the tassel as the plant started to pollinate, which is where the issues occurred.

“I think we do see these plants wrap up each year. Typically it’s more in the mid-vegetative time period, so eighth leaf stage up to 13 or 14 leaf stage,” he says. “This is really rare when it’s wrapping around the tassel as the tassel is starting to shed pollen. I’ve been an agronomist for 20 plus years, and I think this is only the second time I’ve seen it.”

(Eric Snodgrass, Nutrien )

Both Licht and Quinn attribute this rare occurrence of tight tassel wrap during pollination to key environmental issues, including a lot of soil moisture and a sudden switch to high temperatures. The near-record overnight temperatures are also thought to have aided the problem. It was a “perfect storm” for issues to exist, and the hybrids impacted may have been more susceptible to rapid growth syndrome this spring.

“We had rapid growth at the end of that vegetative development,” explains Licht.

Can Bad Genetics or Poor Breeding Also Be to Blame?

Farmers are looking for someone, or something, to blame. After all, they have a lot riding on this year’s crop. And considering the issue is occurring across a wide geography of the Corn Belt, some critics are questioning if the issue is all weather or environmental related.

So that begs the following questions: Is it bad genetics? Is it poor breeding, or any one thing to pinpoint as the cause? Those are the questions we asked Licht.

“I don’t think so,” Licht says. “Yes, it is hybrid specific, and it’s happening across all brands, but some of the hybrids I’m hearing about were planted last year and the year before, but the problem didn’t show up. I think it’s really a combination of the hybrid and the environment coming together perfectly, and it’s more prolific this year.”

The Issue Is Happening Across Several Seed Brands

Similar to Licht’s assessment, Quinn says it seems to be an issue across seed brands.

“I think this issue has been the biggest surprise because the areas where we see significant tassel wrap and the pollination issues are areas you would not expect to have any issues,” Quinn says. “The fields I’ve walked are some of the best corn fields in the state. Iowa has a lot of issues with [tight tassel wrap], but they have outstanding crop conditions in that state.”

Quinn says from the fields he’s scouted, the issue is specific to a late April or first week of May planting date.

“A lot of that corn was reaching pollination in the past couple of weeks,” Quinn says. “If you look at our planting progress, on May 5, we had about 25% of the corn acres planted in Indiana. Based on that number, I would say maybe 10% to 20% of the acres can potentially be impacted in Indiana.”

He says best-case scenario is the tight wrapped tassel caused no pollination issues. Worst case, from what he’s seen, is 20% to 30% of a field is impacted by pollination issues.
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Watch the full discussion with Purdue’s Dan Quinn exclusively on Farm Journal TV.
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Quinn says that’s what makes it so hard to quantify the impact of pollination problems on the size of this year’s crop.

“We still need a lot more time to assess these fields, walk these fields, pull ears and take a look at pollination to get a better handle on the magnitude of it, Quinn says.

Why Isn’t the Corn Market Taking Note?

At the beginning of July, market analysts and traders were continuing to ramp up yield forecasts, which sprouted from the fact crop conditions are so strong, and moisture from the Gulf continued to pump rainfall across the Midwest. Some yield forecasts were as high as 189 bu. per acre, which would be well above the 181 bu. per acre national yield forecast currently projected by USDA.

With no way of knowing the scope or severity of the pollination problems, market analysts say the U.S. corn crop is still shaping up to be good. The pollination problems could trim a few bushels off the extremely high national yield forecasts being thrown around.

“From our vantage point, yes, it does help temper some of the 185, 186, 187 yield forecasts?” says Jim Emter, CEO of Van Ahn and Company. “We’re more in that tune right now of a 179 to 184 [bu. per acre national yield forecast]. It feels like we’re in a race to print the biggest one right now by a lot of people.”

Still, farmers are frustrated. They see the social media posts about pollination problems, and then some walk their own fields, only to find pollination issues firsthand. They’re frustrated the corn market isn’t reacting to what could be an unexpected production problem this year.

AgTraderTalk’s Garrett Toay was on “U.S. Farm Report” this week and was asked why the issue isn’t moving the markets yet.

“Nobody knows,” Toay says. “I’ve talked to industry contacts; I think it’s a fairly widespread issue. It’s not brand specific as we originally thought early on, and what I’m being told is the corn plant grew too quickly in some areas. It works itself out in some areas, but I think the problem of the market is it’s not too concerned about it or not paying attention to it because we don’t know how widespread it is. We don’t know if it will even have an impact on the actual yield. But it’s one of those things we’ll trade when we get there sort of thing.”

Puzzling Problem

It’s a puzzling problem, especially in fields where planting got off to a strong start, and from farmers to agronomists, it’s catching everyone by surprise.

“That’s been the biggest surprise is that we can still have issues even when things look really good out there,” Quinn says.

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Watch the full discussion with Iowa State’s Mark Licht exclusively on Farm Journal TV.

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Near Ideal Growing Conditions?

There’s no secret that pollination problems are an issue in corn this year. However, critics question how weather is playing a factor when the U.S. has experienced near ideal growing conditions this year.

Nutrien’s Eric Snodgrass says moisture has been almost ideal, but the overnight temperatures mgith be playing a factor into the issues farmers are seeing. Watch his discussion, along with the rainfall forecast for the next few weeks.