Emergency Haying 2023

EBinEIA

EBinEIA

New member
Just wondering what everyone is seeing.

The neighbors property has 35 acres CRP on a hill, 10 acres of cedars and evergreens, and a pond. I call it bird mountain. Essentially is the source of birds in the section. Lots of birds. Our bordering farm has a creek with buffer strip that catches the birds as they move off the hill. Well, yesterday I watched them bail up the hill. I was surprised they allowed the whole thing to be cut, would have thought they'd require something like 20% left for the birds. Dad is itching to mow half of the creek. Is what it is, but hard to watch.
 
Of the 4 CRP parcels I have access to, only one is being grazed currently....but there is one I haven't been by yet and it has been baled in the past. The CP38 program for CRP was designed for pheasant recovery, it might hold more restrictions that the other programs. I would talk the old man out of the mowing of the creek.
 
The two fields that I drive by on a daily basis were both cut. They have been cut every year since I've lived here. I haven't had time to do much scouting in the last few days. I'm sure all the usual suspects will look the same.
 
The new drought monitor for Iowa looks really bad. Large areas in NE Iowa that are in the red now. And with a string of 90's on tap and no rain in sight, it wouldn't surprise me if it moved into the worst category by next week, extraordinary drought.

Southeast MN and Southwest WI are just as bad too.

| U.S. Drought Monitor

droughtmonitor.unl.edu droughtmonitor.unl.edu
 
Lots of CRP cut here in Central & Eastern Iowa. Most of what has been cut are fields that I've never seen mowed before in the last several years.
 
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