Cool weather and moisture after flowering often means extended grain-fill and high yields, especially when disease levels are as low as they were at the time of pollination and early grain development in some fields. However, excessive rainfall associated with the cool temperatures could increase the severity of diseases that thrive under cool conditions. But with the crop now well into grain-fill and even turning in some locations, there is very little you can do about late-season diseases.

Wheat is now flowering in parts of northern Ohio and will continue to flower over the next weeks of so. According to the FHB forecasting system (http://www.wheatscab.psu.edu/), the risk for scab is low in central and northern Ohio for fields flowering at this time. Although it has rained over the last 2-4 days in parts of the flowering regions, conditions were relatively cool and dry last week, which likely reduced the risk of the scab fungus infecting the wheat spikes.