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Southeastern South Dakota rain causes some stunting

In the last two weeks, some southeastern South Dakota farmers have had too much rain.  Dave Poppens tells Brownfield it’s unusual to be wishing for less rain in the first week of July.

“The low spots are definitely stunted and yellowing,” Poppens told Brownfield Ag News Monday.  “It’s affecting the yield there, and where it hasn’t drowned out it just doesn’t look very good right now.”

Poppens says his plan is to fly on urea fertilizer where rain has leached nitrogen away from corn roots.

He says what’s growing the most is the vegetation he’d rather not see.

“It’s pretty ugly-looking out there for all the weeds and grass that are coming up,” said Poppens, “and then you have to try and catch it all with just a post application, and that’s going to be tough to get all the weeds killed because they’re growing so fast now with all this moisture and heat we’re having.”

Poppens says they’ve had 7 to 10 inches of rain the last couple of weeks.

The excessive precipitation has resulted in greater topsoil moisture than is normal for the first week in July.  Topsoil moisture is 83 percent adequate to surplus, according to the USDA National Agriculture Statistics Service. South Dakota’s corn crop is 65 percent good to excellent.  Soybeans are 59 percent good to excellent, with 7 percent of the crop blooming.

Southeastern South Dakota farmer Jerry Schmitz tells Brownfield the precipitation prevented some planting.

“We are probably about 25 percent unplanted,” said Schmitz Monday.  “The acres that we did get planted have now drowned out about another 25 percent and it does continue to rain.”

It’s rained about 12 inches in 12 days at Schmitz’s place, which makes him grateful for risk management.

“This is one of those years where [one might say] ‘thank heavens that there is crop insurance,’ especially for younger folks,” said Schmitz.  “It would just be devastating for a young person to go through this and not have a safety net.”

South Dakota winter wheat is 46 percent good to excellent, with 97 percent of the crop headed.  Spring wheat is 51 percent good to excellent, and 81 percent headed.

Sunflowers are 91 percent planted.  South Dakota pastures are 58 percent good to excellent.

AUDIO: David Poppens (4 min. MP3)

AUDIO: Jerry Schmitz (2 min. MP3)