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Drought threatens crops in western, northwestern Corn Belt

A climatologist says crops in the western and northwestern Corn Belt could see some of the greatest drought-related impacts this growing season.

“Parts of the Dakotas, Southern Minnesota, even into portions of Wisconsin, Northwest Iowa, Northeast Nebraska. There’s been a pocket of the region that really has been consistently drier than some of their neighboring areas,” Brian Fuchs with the National Drought Mitigation Center tells Brownfield.

Fuchs says crops in the region could continue to be impacted by the heat and dry conditions in September, including the later-planted corn and soybeans.

“From the tours that went through over the last couple weeks, it looks like the pod numbers are pretty good on most of the soybean plants throughout the entire grain belt. And so we’re going to just be looking at how those pods feel and grain weight.”

The latest U.S. Drought Monitor says exceptional drought is present in Nebraska and Colorado, while conditions are worsening across the Midwest, where 45 percent of the region is dry and more than two percent is in extreme drought.