Current:Home > Contact‘Short corn’ could replace the towering cornfields steamrolled by a changing climate -ProfitSphere Academy
‘Short corn’ could replace the towering cornfields steamrolled by a changing climate
View
Date:2025-04-15 17:47:44
WYOMING, Iowa (AP) — Taking a late-summer country drive in the Midwest means venturing into the corn zone, snaking between 12-foot-tall green, leafy walls that seem to block out nearly everything other than the sun and an occasional water tower.
The skyscraper-like corn is a part of rural America as much as cavernous red barns and placid cows.
But soon, that towering corn might become a miniature of its former self, replaced by stalks only half as tall as the green giants that have dominated fields for so long.
“As you drive across the Midwest, maybe in the next seven, eight, 10 years, you’re going to see a lot of this out there,” said Cameron Sorgenfrey, an eastern Iowa farmer who has been growing newly developed short corn for several years, sometimes prompting puzzled looks from neighboring farmers. “I think this is going to change agriculture in the Midwest.”
The short corn developed by Bayer Crop Science is being tested on about 30,000 acres (12,141 hectares) in the Midwest with the promise of offering farmers a variety that can withstand powerful windstorms that could become more frequent due to climate change. The corn’s smaller stature and sturdier base enable it to withstand winds of up to 50 mph — researchers hover over fields with a helicopter to see how the plants handle the wind.
The smaller plants also let farmers plant at greater density, so they can grow more corn on the same amount of land, increasing their profits. That is especially helpful as farmers have endured several years of low prices that are forecast to continue.
The smaller stalks could also lead to less water use at a time of growing drought concerns.
U.S. farmers grow corn on about 90 million acres (36 million hectares) each year, usually making it the nation’s largest crop, so it’s hard to overstate the importance of a potential large-scale shift to smaller-stature corn, said Dior Kelley, an assistant professor at Iowa State University who is researching different paths for growing shorter corn. Last year, U.S. farmers grew more than 400 tons (363 metric tonnes) of corn, most of which was used for animal feed, the fuel additive ethanol, or exported to other countries.
“It is huge. It’s a big, fundamental shift,” Kelley said.
Researchers have long focused on developing plants that could grow the most corn but recently there has been equal emphasis on other traits, such as making the plant more drought-tolerant or able to withstand high temperatures. Although there already were efforts to grow shorter corn, the demand for innovations by private companies such as Bayer and academic scientists soared after an intense windstorm — called a derecho — plowed through the Midwest in August 2020.
The storm killed four people and caused $11 billion in damage, with the greatest destruction in a wide strip of eastern Iowa, where winds exceeded 100 mph. In cities such as Cedar Rapids, the wind toppled thousands of trees but the damage to a corn crop only weeks from harvest was especially stunning.
“It looked like someone had come through with a machete and cut all of our corn down,” Kelley said.
Or as Sorgenfrey, the Iowa farmer who endured the derecho put it, “Most of my corn looked like it had been steamrolled.”
Although Kelley is excited about the potential of short corn, she said farmers need to be aware that cobs that grow closer to the soil could be more vulnerable to diseases or mold. Short plants also could be susceptible to a problem called lodging, when the corn tilts over after something like a heavy rain and then grows along the ground, Kelley said.
Brian Leake, a Bayer spokesman, said the company has been developing short corn for more than 20 years. Other companies such as Stine Seed and Corteva also have been working for a decade or longer to offer short-corn varieties.
While the big goal has been developing corn that can withstand high winds, researchers also note that a shorter stalk makes it easier for farmers to get into fields with equipment for tasks such as spreading fungicide or seeding the ground with a future cover crop.
Bayer expects to ramp up its production in 2027, and Leake said he hopes that by later in this decade, farmers will be growing short corn everywhere.
“We see the opportunity of this being the new normal across both the U.S. and other parts of the world,” he said.
veryGood! (855)
Related
- Charges tied to China weigh on GM in Q4, but profit and revenue top expectations
- Julianne Hough Recalls How Relationship With Ex Ryan Seacrest Impacted Her Career
- Shop the 10 Best Under $30 Sulfate-Free Shampoos
- A kid's guide to climate change (plus a printable comic)
- Rolling Loud 2024: Lineup, how to stream the world's largest hip hop music festival
- EPA's proposal to raise the cost of carbon is a powerful tool and ethics nightmare
- How King Charles III and the Royal Family Are Really Doing Without the Queen
- How Love Is Blind’s Amber Pike Is Shading the Show
- Toyota to invest $922 million to build a new paint facility at its Kentucky complex
- Miley Cyrus Goes Back to Her Roots With Brunette Hair Transformation
Ranking
- IRS recovers $4.7 billion in back taxes and braces for cuts with Trump and GOP in power
- Detroit, Chicago and the Midwest blanketed by wildfire haze from Canada
- Joseph Baena Reveals How He Powered Past the Comments About Being Arnold Schwarzenegger's Son
- TikToker Jake Octopusslover8 Shane Shares How Amassing Millions of Followers Impacted His Mental Health
- Most popular books of the week: See what topped USA TODAY's bestselling books list
- California's flooding reveals we're still building cities for the climate of the past
- California's destructively wet winter has a bright side. You'll want to see it
- It Cosmetics Flash Deal: Get $123 Worth of Products for Just $77
Recommendation
'Survivor' 47 finale, part one recap: 2 players were sent home. Who's left in the game?
Get a $39 Deal on $141 Worth of Peter Thomas Roth Skincare Products
Biden pledged to stop funding fossil fuels overseas. It's not stopping one agency
Desperate migrants are choosing to cross the border through dangerous U.S. desert
Former Syrian official arrested in California who oversaw prison charged with torture
News Round Up: aquatic vocal fry, fossilizing plankton and a high seas treaty
Keke Palmer Comments on Her Sexuality and Gender Identity While Receiving Vanguard Award
El Niño is coming. Here's what that means for weather in the U.S.