All sorts of plants have benefited from this summer’s combination of heat and — to this point — plenty of rain. It’s been an even better growing season than last year’s cool and rainy summer.

“The heat is definitely better than the cool weather for many of our common landscape and garden plants,” said Jennifer Smith, Douglas County horticulture agent for Kansas State University Extension. “As temperatures increase — to a point, of course — so do many of the internal processes in a plant.

“So, photosynthetic rates increase and result in more plant growth, said Smith. “The amount of increase is exponential, too.”

While Smith was addressing yard and garden growth, her counterpart on the crop side, County Agent Bill Wood, agreed with her assessment.

“We’d rather have rain than drought and we’ve had that the last two years,” said Wood. “Corn loves the heat. There was a point where you could almost measure it and watch it grow. But pollination is helped by cool (temperatures).

“(Soy)beans pretty much love the heat, too,” he said. “Getting the ground warm makes the seeds really come up. Once it’s growing, I think corn likes the heat more than the beans.”

Although growing conditions have been ideal, he’s not predicting a bumper crop yet. Right now his crop report rates the corn as 15 to 20 percent excellent, 30 percent good, 30 to 40 percent fair and 10 percent poor. As always with farming, it’s a lot about timing.

“We’ve got a lot of variety,” said Wood. “We’ve got some corn and soybeans that got in at the right time that are looking good. Then there are some farmers who had to replant and had flooding whose fields aren’t looking good.”

And there’s still a lot of growing season left before harvest time, which is another reason he’s not claiming bumper crop.

“The corn will probably be fine, no matter what,” he said. “August is when we like to have rain for the soybeans. August is key for them. We won’t know until the combines roll. The truth is what’s in the bin.”

Likewise, Smith said the mostly favorable conditions also have their drawbacks in the yard and garden.

“The fine line is that some plants, like tomatoes, will only bloom and set fruit at certain temperatures,” said Smith. “Also, many fungi that cause diseases also grow better with lots of heat and moisture. My lawn is growing like crazy and it is full of a fungus disease called brown patch.”