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Following is a description of the orientation crop scouts encountered before embarking on the tour May 4, 2010

The 53nd Annual Hard Winter Wheat Tour coordinated by the Wheat Quality Council opened May 3 in Manhattan,  Kansas.

The Wheat Quality Council is founded on the idea of finding  improvement in soft red and hard red winter wheat varieties. Millers and  bakers use the council for application purposes and to gain feedback on  various aspects of the wheat varieties. Originally, the crop tour was a field  day event, used as a chance to take customers out in the fields and introduce  them to the growth cycle of wheat and the progress of the crop. It has now  evolved into the present-day estimations of how many bushels this year's  harvest will produce.

The three basic goals of the wheat tour are as follows:

• Provide interaction for all sectors of agribusiness,  accomplished through all members of the tour eating dinner together at the  end of the day and the switching of participants who ride in the car on a  daily basis.  
• Define crop prospects of up to 90% of the wheat  areas in Kansas by using Kansas agricultural statistics based on the past  year's data.
• Provide general exposure to the state of Kansas.   

All  participants arrived and received car assignments for the next day's wheat  evaluation. Orientation was comprised of the introduction of coordinators  and all participants and a basic overview of what the crop tour is based on.   Participants were reminded that this tour is only a snapshot of what  is observed on these three days of the tour.

In testing Kansas and area wheat fields for yield evaluation, these are the major steps involved.

• Enter the field at representative area.   
• Count the number of stalks per foot in at least five  random locations and calculate an average number of stalks per foot for the  selected field.  
• Count all stalks, regardless of stage of formation.   
• Use  the formula given based on 2000-2009 Kansas wheat objective yield data to  estimate the number of heads.  
• Select the formula that represents the area of the  state where counts are being made.  
• Measure the distance in inches between the rows.   
• For  average weight per head use the average given for the region of the state  where observations are made.  
• Enter findings into the yield formula given.   
• Enter observations and calculation estimates onto  observation sheet.  
• Observations are just as important as factual data.  Other factors only you can observe. It also does not take into account  harvesting loss, which generally averages about 1.5 bushels per acre.

According to Jim Shroyer, an Agronomist with Kansas State University and crop tour participant, the wheat observed on this year's wheat tour appears to be good to very good at this stage in crop developmen..  "There will be some differences in the crop considering how late some of the producers were in planting last fall," according to Shroyer.  "After the long winter, the wheat growth was behind schedule, but now is ahead of schedule due to higher nighttime temperatures in the month of April." Some evidence of this rapid development can be seen in a smaller flag leaf. "A smaller flag leaf can be evident in the southern areas, while northern areas of the state experienced more snow for an extended period of time over the winter months," according to Dean Stoskopf, a Hoisington, KS wheat producer and Kansas Wheat Commissioner. The flag leaf contains 70% to 80% of the wheat plant's nutrients.

As far as possible disease, "The crop currently looks as good (at this time) as it is ever going to look," according to Erick De Wolf of Kansas State University Agronomy Dept. Some of the disease concerns in the crop this year include leaf and stripe rust. "While there are low levels of concern regarding disease, there is a potential for the wheat plant to get to high levels of disease fairly quickly," said De Wolf. "Disease impacts the plant in two ways, including destroying the infrastructure of the plant, and stealing resources from the plant," said De Wolf. "Powdery mildew could be evident but is at the low end of concern at this time."

Wheat seeded in Kansas in the fall of 2009 for the 2010 crop totaled 8.6 million acres, down 700,000 acres from the 2009 planted crop.  The USDA on Monday, May 3 estimated the Kansas wheat crop at 70% good to excellent, compared to 73% last week.

Participants were divided into groups of two to three people with 15 cars  assigned to different routes with the intent of arriving in Colby, Kansas by  5:00 p.m. the next day.

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