Apparent Yield

The "Apparent Yield" product provides an end-of-season simulation of yield in production per acre assuming that current weather patterns at some point in the growing season will persist until harvest. That is, weather conditions are not expected to go through their normal variation during a season, but rather are assumed to be similar to the day of the product.

Apparent yield is useful as an early-season reference point for estimating the at-harvest yield. For example, if an apparent yield is very high early in the season, clients could track over time the incremental downward changes in the estimated yield. The early-season, very high apparent yield would represent an upper limit to the range of potential at-harvest yields.

The same argument holds for a very low apparent yield early in the season. A very low apparent yield represents a lower limit to the range of potential at-harvest yields. An example of the Apparent Yield product in map form is shown below at the county scale for the conterminous US on June 30, 2008.