Photo by George Lauby Heavy steam rises in the early morning hours Wednesday from the grain dryer in front of the towers at Ag Valley Coop in North Platte.

Even on a warm mid-November afternoon, most of the corn in Lincoln County is too wet to harvest.

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The temperature reached 55 degrees in North Platte Tuesday, but the harvest crept along.

The driest corn arriving at the Ag Valley Coop elevator in North Platte contained 19-20 percent water, elevator manager Kent Weems said.

When farmers brought samples to the elevator to check moisture, the typical result was in the mid- to upper-20s. There are a lot of pivot-irrigated fields that wet, Weems said.

Corn must be near 15 percent to store safely.

It does not dry rapidly.

The mechanical dryer is running night and day at the elevator. Every other day during harvest weather, the elevator closes from early afternoon through the next morning to give the dryer 18-19 hours to catch up with corn deliveries.

Some corn might not get much drier in the field, Weems said. Some ‘long-season’ varieties fell victim to a cool and wet year and did not reach maturity before the growing season ended.

That corn is so wet that mold can grow inside the husk and the ear could rot, University of Nebraska specialists warn. NU offers a discussion of how to deal with the late harvest. It will be broadcast Nov. 18 and can be seen at http://real.unl.edu/harvest.php. Topics include ear rots and grain molds.

Yields are good, Weems said. Some dryland corn has hit 160 bushels to the acre, an almost unheard-of amount.

High temperatures are predicted to reach the mid-50s the rest of the week and cool to the mid-40s early next week. No rain is forecast, according to the National Weather Service in North Platte. That could help some, but odds are good that it will be a long, slow a harvest season, Weems said.