impact of drought

oldandnew said:
This will adjust the wall streeters thinking on farmland value. If its not a pig in a poke, they find some other avenue for short term profit. Now we grinding corn to silage, if it does not rain, the wind will raise havock across the tree sawed hedgerows, and vacant plains of dirt. Only man is creating his own disasters. Maybe instead of a tile plow, this would be a time to retire a lot of acres to set aside programs. this how the thirties started, we in my neck, in Kansas City, we are 5 " or so under in rainfall, have seen a shower in weeks, it's 100 degrees for 3 weeks, my yard looks like burned up short grass hay, just the dogs trampling make it dust, and the trees about 20' tall have lost their leaves to dormancy, and or are dead. Waiting for the fire. I can believe the 4th of July idiots didn't get us already. The landowners are worse off, record flood last year, no rain this year, year before last, to cold for corn to tassle right, we had sild streaming down on not exsiting ears. Alot of good producers will not survive this, and the risk takers are going to fail, unless the have a bank to keep them alive. Then they'll give up so much profit, it will be 5 years to get even, assuming conditions are normal. How does that 300.00 an acre cash rent on 7500.00 purchase price per acre ground look now. Looks like chinese overtime, the more you work, you get less for hour of labor.
Click to expand...
O&N, got my cash rent checks for this year in the bank and spent, signing papers friday for 200 acres new CRP. Glad I opted not to go into crop shares this year. Sleeping good at night. Got 100 acres of crop ground to crop next year and might try to do as much myself with that as possible and skip all the insurance and GOV subsidies. Could treat as one huge food plot and sell off what i need to for cash. Leave rest for hunters and wildlife. Thinking maybe planting some milo. The original drought crop.

It seems the demise of cash crops is the rise of conservation and hunting.
 
moellermd said:
Might be a great time to get the tile plow in there.
Click to expand...

By what I'm hearing farmers are haying portions of their CRP to feed their livestock? Maybe I'm wrong and you'd know better than I.

Anyway, if that's the case, that is, farmers are able to keep their livestock fed due to CRP/wet land grasses, wouldn't it be a wise move to keep such areas in place or even expand on them for future drought.

Wide spread drought will hit again. God forbid this thing goes for the next few years or so:(
 
A bit of good news--got and email from a friend that lives about 8 miles wsw of Platte, 1.44" rain, .88 1 mile east of Platte and 1.25 in New Holland but not much down near Lake Andes. Should carry the beans for awhile.:)
 
1pheas4 said:
By what I'm hearing farmers are haying portions of their CRP to feed their livestock? Maybe I'm wrong and you'd know better than I.

Anyway, if that's the case, that is, farmers are able to keep their livestock fed due to CRP/wet land grasses, wouldn't it be a wise move to keep such areas in place or even expand on them for future drought.

Wide spread drought will hit again. God forbid this thing goes for the next few years or so:(
Click to expand...

I like it! The soil bank and the "HAY BANK"!:cheers:
 
1pheas4 said:
By what I'm hearing farmers are haying portions of their CRP to feed their livestock? Maybe I'm wrong and you'd know better than I.

Anyway, if that's the case, that is, farmers are able to keep their livestock fed due to CRP/wet land grasses, wouldn't it be a wise move to keep such areas in place or even expand on them for future drought.

Wide spread drought will hit again. God forbid this thing goes for the next few years or so:(
Click to expand...

It was more of a tongue in cheek comment. There is a reason some land is swampy and most of the time it is more of a battle then it is worth to farm it. I bet a lot of guys will be plowing up wetlands if they can wanting to make up for this year.
 
1pheas4 said:
By what I'm hearing farmers are haying portions of their CRP to feed their livestock? Maybe I'm wrong and you'd know better than I.

Anyway, if that's the case, that is, farmers are able to keep their livestock fed due to CRP/wet land grasses, wouldn't it be a wise move to keep such areas in place or even expand on them for future drought.

Wide spread drought will hit again. God forbid this thing goes for the next few years or so:(
Click to expand...

To be honest the CRP isn't going to make good feed and should probably just be left in the field. They are releasing it way to late. August 2nd is the first day it can be hayed. With the heat and drought it should have been baled two weeks ago. Baled after August 2nd the feed value is going to be about the same as wheat straw. Feedstuffs are very short though so it will get baled and have some liquid feed added to it just like the many guys are planning to do with wheat straw.
 
Called my FSA office today just to check on the CRP for haying or grazing and I found out that: NONE of my CRP is in the program as it is all Farmed Wetlands or CP-33 edge cover and that is not approved--I was just curious and not planning on haying or grazing any--mine is for the wildlife.:thumbsup:
 
SHE IS A DRY ONE!!!!!

Wife and I drove through SD from MN on I90. Started looking dry as soon as we hit Sioux Falls. I would say that from there to our place which is probably 90 miles I don't know of a filed of corn that would produce any kind of yield at all as there are no ears on the stalks. That is pretty bad.

When we got to farm all sloughs were dry and only one dugout had water in it.

Neighbors slough across way had water in it.

Everything looked like it was struggling as far as cover and trees: Kochia and switchgrass. I could hardly drive down driveway because kochia had grown so tall since I was last out a month ago. Kochia was green and lush. Everything else was dry, brown and stunted. I did flush 1 week old pheasant chick while mowing driveway and one that was about 1/2 to 3/4 grown. Ton's of grasshoppers but not much at all for other insects.

20 acres of new trees were doing OK considering how dry and hot it has been. 107 this week I was told.

Went in to FSA to sign some CRP papers and local farmer across from me was going to hay 50% of his CRP.

The CRP that was normally 5-6' tall this time last year was maybe 1-2' tall. All the flowering plants in cool season stands were dead or dormant.

I would say these are not favorable conditions for new broods. I did not see the numbers of broods this time that I saw a month ago. I hope I am surprised by fall.

NRCS says that part of lower part of state may move to D3 drought status. I think further north they have faired better for moisture.

Some good news is we got .5 inches of rain last night. Probably need 6-10" to make any kind of difference.

I would say both corn and soybeans in this general area are a total loss.

Keep in mind, most farmers carry crop insurance at about 70% of their proven yield at a rate that was set back in March which if I recall was somewhere in the $5/bushel range. So if the proven yield was 100 bushels an acre farmer would have got paid for 70 bushels at $5/bushel per acre.

After inputs, nobody is getting rich off that deal I don't think.
I am glad I did cash rent and more CRP this year versus trying my hand at share cropping. I won't get into all the details but I would have lost big time this year.
 
Not a good thing Chris---not sure what it will bring this bird season but I'll be there anyway. I've got a trip to Platte coming up and I'm not sure what I will find but your report is not very encouraging:(--I'll report what I find--maybe in the coming weeks there will be some rain.
 
The Mrs. and I toured the east farm this morning. More of the same. Not a lot of pheasant sightings but did flush 1 hen and brood and chicks were very young flyers (1-2 weeks).

I would say 90% of all potholes have dried up in my neck of the woods.

I think the conditions in mid to late June were ideal for pheasants but in July it moved to the other ends of the extreme.

Road counts are coming up and may tell.
 
Dry weather does encourage grasshoppers. Grasshoppers get moisture from greens and pheasants get nutrients and moisture from grasshoppers.
The lack of cover will be a problem.
Is there some decent cover in the dried out sloughs?
 
mnmthunting said:
Dry weather does encourage grasshoppers. Grasshoppers get moisture from greens and pheasants get nutrients and moisture from grasshoppers.
The lack of cover will be a problem.
Is there some decent cover in the dried out sloughs?
Click to expand...

MN, grasshoppers have gone crazy within the past month or so. Lots and lots of grasshoppers! All good.


Uguide, you're birds are alive and well. Don't worry too much about not seeing a lot of birds this go-a-round. That happens to me all the time. One weekend there's bird's, then it's as if they all but disappear. Then, their back again. Birds move around, most are old enough to cover some ground now.

Birds are doing okay. We'll see a nice increase in numbers this year unless something very nasty happens (Hail!). As of now, all things are looking up.
 
Ok guys, bare with me here as this may be a dumb question. You guys out that way don't have any irrigation ditches or ag wells at all? You rely solely on rain fall for the crops? The only crop around here that's not irrigated is winter wheat. Sorry if this is a dumb question but this is very foreign for a guy out west where EVERY river is damned for irrigation and all farmers can suck up ground water with their ag wells during years where there is no snow on the mountains.
 
Up here most crops are center pivot irrigated from wells. In the heavy soil areas of MN there is very little irrigation. Same with ND and SD. The heavier soils to the East usual have more of a problem with to wet especially in the Spring and harvest. As you go West the annual precipe drops and more and more irrigation.
The big Rivers are all dammed up, lots of irrigation along the main river valleys.
 
I see. It seems a good ag well would be good insurance against years like this, hell you don't even need a pymp motor, just hook up the pto on your biggest tractor, pull a ditch, and let her rip.
 
1pheas4 said:
MN, grasshoppers have gone crazy within the past month or so. Lots and lots of grasshoppers! All good.


Uguide, you're birds are alive and well. Don't worry too much about not seeing a lot of birds this go-a-round. That happens to me all the time. One weekend there's bird's, then it's as if they all but disappear. Then, their back again. Birds move around, most are old enough to cover some ground now.

Birds are doing okay. We'll see a nice increase in numbers this year unless something very nasty happens (Hail!). As of now, all things are looking up.
Click to expand...

I hope you are right! I mowed 20 acres of new tress yesterday and saw 2 hens and one brood of 4. Not a ton of cover there but I expected more birds in those trees. I only saw 1 rooster and heard one cackle the whole time I was there.
 
UGUIDE said:
I hope you are right! I mowed 20 acres of new tress yesterday and saw 2 hens and one brood of 4. Not a ton of cover there but I expected more birds in those trees. I only saw 1 rooster and heard one cackle the whole time I was there.
Click to expand...

I am afraid that numbers might be worse than we think. This hot and dry can't be good for chicks.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top