Grain farmer Tim Appell is one of the reasons why Lafayette County consistently sports the highest per-acre corn yield in Wisconsin. His yields have topped the state contest, and he’s placed second nationally.

“I try to keep fertilization up on all my land,” he says. “We use a lot of fertilizer.”

That calls for a lot of inputs on Appell’s farms that stretch 48 miles from Shullsburg to New Glarus, but for Appell, it pays off in corn and soybean yields. And it helps push the Lafayette County average corn yield to 217.6 bushels per acre, tops in the state last year, according to USDA. That calculates to 26.2 million bushels from 124,200 acres, third highest in the state.

Appell’s part in all that is 2,600 acres of corn and soybeans, plus another 700 to 800 custom corn acres, he says. He credits “a really good group of agronomy guys from FS who check our crops” for helping him.

“I think it’s how we manage our crops,” he says. “We keep a great eye on [them].”

Jordyn Sattler, University of Wisconsin Extension regional crops and soils agent, adds, “We have pretty good soils in Lafayette County — silt loam and good organic matter.” That contributes to high yields.

HARVEST: The Appells farm 2,600 acres of owned and rented land. This year they are growing 1,600 acres of corn and 1,000 acres of soybeans.

No matter the combination, Appell, at 48 years old, is happy to be where he is both in farming in general and in a prime crop-growing area of Wisconsin.

“I love farming,” he says. “I grew up on a farm mostly with my grandparents. I spent a lot of my life with them because I love farming. When they passed, I worked in town a couple of years. About 15 years ago, I started on my own and just kept going. I give a lot of credit to my grandparents.”

Considering his numerous first and second placings in grain yield contests, which he enters every year, Appell says, “We have been very fortunate in corn and soybeans. ... We’ve been very, very, very fortunate.”

Crop successes prompted Appell to purchase a commercial grain facility with 1.25 million bushels of storage capacity in his hometown of Shullsburg. His wife, Wendy, manages it and also handles the farm records.

The farm has no livestock other than a few show pigs raised by his son, Remington. He and his sister, Jada, both help on the farm, along with three full-time and a few part-time employees.

Conservation-minded farmer

Appell is a no-till farmer. “I try to do as much no-till as I possibly can,” he says. “And I use a ton of cover crops. It’s very challenging, but I really do believe in raising good crops.”

Mostly he uses rye as a cover crop and finds it works well. “I’ve had great success with it,” he says, though he reports challenges the last two years because of moisture issues.

Appell usually rotates corn and beans annually, occasionally planting corn on corn before beans. He’s used wheat or rye in the rotation but not often. This year it’s 1,600 acres of corn and 1,000 acres of soybeans. He shoots for average yields of 225 bushels in corn and 70-plus bushels in beans.

Marketing is largely to ethanol plants. There are a lot of nearby markets, so he has several choices.

“We have to make money,” Appell says. He’s a firm believer in crop insurance, which his wife sells.

As large as his farm is, Appell acknowledges that he is always looking for more land to buy or rent.

“We love renting at a fair price,” he says, but asks with a chuckle, “Who knows what a fair price is?”