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Soil moisture minimal across Midwest

A climatologist says he’s concerned about soil moisture levels across the Midwest.

Eric Hunt with the University of Nebraska-Lincoln says, “We have very low soil moisture in the top part of the profile for pretty much everywhere in the central US north of I-70 and certainly West of I-35. Again, we are just really, really short of moisture here across the Western Corn Belt and central Great Plains.”

He says recent precipitation has been minimal. “There’s a couple of pockets in southeastern Iowa and western Illinois that did pick up some beneficial precipitation late last week. That’s basically the only place in the Midwest that’s seen any decent precipitation of late.”

Hunt says there could be some low-pressure systems by the end of the month. “We are starting to see some signal, especially in the artificial intelligence of the European model, of digging a deeper trough into the West and depending on where this goes, would kind of determine who all would get the best moisture out of this.”

He says the dry conditions have allowed farmers to harvest at a rapid pace.