Wednesday showers and the July 4th holiday delayed a wrap-up of the 2019 wheat harvest in Kingfisher County.

Local Weather Observer Steve Loftis reported an additional .11 inch of moisture falling in Kingfisher at midweek, registering .01 inch on Wednesday and .10 inch on Thursday.

Heavier rains were reported elsewhere. Heaviest rainfall reported on the Mesonet was 3.8 inches at Blackwell.

Marshall received .79 inch.

B.J. Waeger, manager of the Wheeler Brothers Elevator at Omega, was on the job Thursday, reporting two farmers were working to wrap up the harvest in that area.

Harvest in the Omega area was hampered by a .2 inch rain Wednesday night after a .1 inch shower the preceding day.

Waeger said there were other reports of an .8 inch rain in the Omega area and a three-inch rain in the Loyal vicinity earlier in the week.

Randall Varnell, manager of the Wheeler Brothers elevator in Kingfisher, reported a slowdown to the harvest but he expected to dump some truckloads after lunch on Thursday.

Mark Kirchner, manager of CHS Elevator in Hennessey, said a “pretty good shower” on Wednesday delayed harvesting operations in the north area of the county but he planned to be open after noon Thursday.

Eugene Roach, manager of the CHS Elevator at Loyal reported a few producers still cutting wheat on Friday. He said the completion date of the harvest would depend on the rain.

Roach confirmed a three-inch downpour about two miles north of the elevator and also a heavy rain southeast of Watonga.

John Schaefer, Cashion Grain and Feed elevator manager, said the harvest was pretty much done in that area.

Commenting on the 2019 harvest as a whole, Schaefer said some (rain-caused) light test weights was a concern.

“Our wheat goes primarily to bread making,” he said, and the lighter weight wheat cannot be used for that.

Schaefer said a few more loads may come in as producers cut the mud holes that they avoided earlier but any additional harvesting would likely be sporadic.

CHS Elevator at Okarche called the 2019 harvest “over” on Friday.

Kristi Washington at Okarche Grain and Feed Elevator, commented, “We’re done.”

She said that producers generally were happy with yields in that area.