Find crop-specific nutrient needs for Minnesota, including guidelines for nitrogen, phosphate, potash and other fertilizers, and strategies for ensuring crops get the nutrients they need.
Growing corn in Minnesota
Selecting the right hybrids for your cropping systems and optimizing planting and harvest are the foundations for maximizing corn yield and profitability.
Understanding how corn grows and develops is important, as the crop stage informs decisions on pest management, crop damage and harvest.
8.9 million
# acres in corn in Minnesota
4th
rank of corn production in U.S.
$7.2 billion
value of corn production in Minnesota*
Growing, maintaining, and harvesting corn
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Corn growth and development – By understanding how corn grows and develops, producers can more confidently assess crop damage, estimate if it will recover, and apply herbicides and other crop inputs at the best time.
Selecting corn hybrids by crop use
- How to select corn hybrids for grain production
- Corn Agronomy Forum: Review of 2020 season and hybrid selection (2020; video; 01:02:31)
- How to select corn hybrids for silage production
Minnesota corn hybrid trials
Corn grain field crop variety trials — The Minnesota Corn Evaluation Program provides unbiased information for corn growers when they choose which brand of corn to buy and grow. Find the most recent report, as well as archived materials.
Corn silage hybrid trials — The Minnesota Hybrid Corn Silage Evaluation Program evaluates the silage potential of corn hybrids in Minnesota. The program’s goal is to provide unbiased forage yield and forage quality information for educational and marketing programs.
See the regional corn hybrid and other trials for southern and northwestern Minnesota.
Corn nutrient needs
- Fertilizing corn in Minnesota
- Using banded fertilizer for corn production
- Banding fertilizer with corn seed
Nitrogen
- Nitrogen — Understand how nitrogen behaves in soil, fertilizer rates by crop, how to apply urea and minimize losses, and best practices for soil testing
- The pre-sidedress nitrate soil test (PSNT) is a tool for deciding whether a supplemental nitrogen application is needed. The soil samples are typically taken in June, around the V6 growth stage, before sidedressing N.
- Best practices for taking PSNT samples (2017; video: 04:30)
- Best practices for handling PSNT samples (2017; video: 03:51)
Nitrogen and alfalfa-corn rotations
- How alfalfa stand age affects N credit — Alfalfa typically contributes large amounts of nitrogen (N) to subsequent corn crops, which can dramatically reduce fertilizer needs.
- Tools to predict nitrogen needs in corn following alfalfa — Nitrogen management tools examined include: Book value nitrogen credits (BVNC), Pre-sidedress soil nitrate test (PSNT), Illinois soil nitrogen test (ISNT).
When growers follow research-based strategies for planting corn in Minnesota, they position themselves to maximize yield and economic return.
- Strategies for successful corn planting
- Strategies to optimize corn silage production
- When to plant corn
- Optimal plant populations - To maximize profit, research shows Minnesota growers need a final stand of 32,000 to 34,000 plants per acre.
- Narrow-row corn production in Minnesota - Producing corn in narrow rows can increase grain yield as much as 7 to 9 percent in Minnesota. However, narrow rows don’t always pay off.
- Considerations for late-planted corn in Minnesota - When wet soil conditions delay planting, growers face several decisions.
- Evaluating crop damage and replant options
Corn cropping systems
- Adding alfalfa to corn-soybean rotation has the potential to increase soybean and corn yields. Such rotations provide more options for reducing agronomic inputs without sacrificing corn yield.
- Managing the rotation from alfalfa to corn
The Extension crops team can help you with disease diagnosis. Use the Digital Crop Doc to tell us more about your field situation and submit photos. One of our team members will contact you with a diagnosis, a request for more information, or suggest you submit the samples to a plant disease clinic.
Diseases
- Anthracnose
- Eyespot
- Goss’s bacterial wilt and blight
- Gray leaf spot
- Holcus spot
- Northern (Helminthosporium) leaf spot
- Northern corn leaf blight
- Rust - common and southern
- Smut - common
- Corn ear rots and mycotoxins
Insects
- Aphids in post-pollination corn
- Armyworm in corn
- Black cutworm
- European corn borer in Minnesota field corn
- Grasshopper management in Minnesota crops
- How to scout for corn rootworm beetles
- Reducing Bt corn acreage to cut production costs
- Sampling for 1st generation European corn borer (2015; video: 02:18)
- Seedcorn maggot
- White grubs in corn
- Wireworms and corn
Resources
Handy Bt trait table (updated 2025), Texas A&M Extension
- How to manage flooded or saturated conditions
- How heat and water stress affect corn while it’s pollinating
- What to do when spring frost damages your Minnesota corn crop
- How to handle hail and wind damage to Minnesota corn
- How hail and wind impact pollinating corn
- Assessing mid-season hail damage (2020; video: 08:12)
- Guide to managing early fall frost - Early frost can mean yield loss for corn producers, although the damage’s severity varies depending on local climate conditions, crop maturity, and topographical features.
Find strategies for harvesting corn in Minnesota to maximize crop quality and minimize storage losses.
- Crop residue management
- Harvesting drought-stressed corn for silage
- Harvest strategies for corn silage
- Pre-harvest considerations for corn grain
- Corn Agronomy Forum: Pre-harvest considerations (2020; video: 31:42)
Grain drying
- Dryeration and in-storage cooling for corn
- Energy costs for corn drying and cooling
- Natural-air corn drying
Grain storage
Crop production resources
Cover crops
Keeping living roots in the ground year-round can improve water management, soil protection, and nutrient scavenging.
Institute for Ag Professionals
We connect ag professionals with the latest crop research to help them make economically and environmentally wise crop management decisions.
Midwest weather and nutrient management decision tools
Decision support tools, resource materials, and training methods to support data-driven decision-making and the adoption of climate-resilient practices.
The Integrated Pest Management podcast alerts growers, ag professionals, and educators to emerging pest concerns on Minnesota field crops, including corn, soybeans, small grains, and alfalfa. We also review recent pest trends and research updates.
Farm Information Line
Contact the Farm Information Line for research-based information and resources from local Extension educators and staff. This statewide service connects you to Extension resources and information to answer your agriculture and natural resource questions.
Email: [email protected]
Phone: 1-800-232-9077
Please leave a detailed message including your name, contact information, the county you are inquiring about, and your specific question. We respond to voicemails and emails Monday through Friday.
Learn more about crop production
The University of Minnesota Extension crops team helps producers take control of their decisions to increase profitability and reduce economic and environmental risks. Our researchers and educators work in pest management, agricultural drainage and water management, soil management and health, climate and weather, and pesticide safety.
*Corn by-the-numbers from the USDA Crop Production Summary 2025:
- 8.9 million acres in corn in Minnesota, based on the USDA-NIFA report for the 2025 crop year. This number has fluctuated between 8.2 and 8.9 million acres over 2023-2026.
- Minnesota consistently ranks fourth in the nation for corn production according to the USDA.
- Average yield in Minnesota in 2025, according to the USDA report, was 201 bushels per acre at an average return of $4 per bushel. There is a similar gross return per acre for corn silage compared with corn grain.
- 201 bushels/acre x 8,900,000 acres x $4/bushel = $7,155,600,000
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