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Still too cool to plant for most of Wisconsin

Cool soil temperatures have Wisconsin farmers focused on manure and fertilizer applications and some spring tillage.

Others, like Zeb Zuehls, who raises beef and no-till corn and soybeans near Montello in southcentral Wisconsin tells Brownfield he’s making a few repairs, and the planter is still in the shed. “I won’t plant for two weeks yet.”

Zuehls says it takes a little longer for soil temperatures to warm up in a no-till system, and right now, the ground is still too cold. “It’s 42 degrees at two inches. That’s where my soil temp is at right now, and 44 at eight inches , 44 degrees at twenty inches. That’s interesting, and then 42 at forty inches.”

Statewide soil temperatures are monitored by the University of Wisconsin’s Wisconet weather stations, and one of them is on Zuehls’ farm.  Wisconsin’s soil temperatures at two inches were in the low 40s for the southern two thirds of the state, and the mid to upper 30s up north Thursday morning, with two sites in Monroe and Door County have soil temps above 50. As seen in the image, soil temperatures warmed up by 3:00 pm CDT.