Kyle Henninger got an unwelcome surprise last fall when he sent three loads of corn to the mill.
His go-to buyer rejected the grain because it tested too high for aflatoxin â a fungal byproduct that the Lehigh Valley farmer had never faced before.
âThe corn looked as good as the other corn looked,â he said.
Henninger was far from the only Pennsylvania corn grower to deal with aflatoxin in the 2020 crop.
The aspergillus fungus that produces the toxin prefers hot, dry conditions, which prevailed last summer, especially in the central and western parts of the state.
âWe really often just hear of one grower here, another grower here who thinks they might have aflatoxin in any given year,â said Alyssa Collins, a Penn State field crop pathologist. âI think it was kind of unusual that we had a good deal of it this year, and that is almost certainly related to the fact that we had droughty conditions.â