Farmers in the northern Corn Belt are still trying to access just how much damage was done by the frost and freeze this past weekend. And according to USDA, the frigid air was a record breaker.
USDA meteorologist Brad Rippey says northern Iowa saw the third latest freeze in history, only behind the years 1897 and 1947.
April Hemmes farms in Hampton, Iowa. She says temperatures dipped to 32-degrees over the weekend, killing nearly all of her planted soybeans.
“I have a 450-acre field all around my house and all but 70 acres of it was no till soybeans, so pretty much all of it except for my end rows were hurt,” she says. “Anywhere there wasn’t a lot of trash seemed to survive, but what do you do now? Do you go put your planter down, pick it up, put it down, pick it up, or do you just replant the whole field? So I think I’m just going to go out there and hit it hard.”
At first glance you might think this first picture is a newly notill soybeans look closer! Frost got almost all of my soybeans! #replant2021 pic.twitter.com/7AACCtkwse
— April (@aprilhemmes) June 1, 2021
Hemmes says concerned about seed availability this late in the year, she already secured the seed she needs for replant. With crop insurance adjusters walking her fields this week, the verdict is still out on corn. She says the corn is turning colors and looks poor, but she’s doesn’t know just how bad the corn crop was impacted by the frigid air.
Corn in bottom ground! pic.twitter.com/9Nbzx4CHjb
— April (@aprilhemmes) June 1, 2021
On soybeans, she says it’s visibly clear. A conservation practice that’s saved the crop in drought-stricken areas this year, was the one factor that hurt soybeans during the cold, as the acres planted in no-till seem to be hurt the worst.
“Just the no till beans were the ones really hurt,” says Hemmes. “In fact, my neighbor right across the stream lightly tilled his field. He had trapped his corn stocks, then tilled it and then planted it in beans. His beans are beautiful, clean as can be.”
The Iowa farmer says row spacing or hybrid didn’t matter. Tillage in the field made the difference in this past weekend’s damaging freeze.
“I planted some 15-inch rows, some 30-inch, it didn’t matter,” says Hemmes. “It was an equal opportunity hybrid killer, too. I thought when I got to the higher ground, because this is kind of rolling ground, the crop would be okay. But those fields were damaged, too.”
With heat and dry weather in the forecast this week, she’s optimistic she’ll get her soybean crop replanted. However, Hemmes says her area in north central Iowa is dry and in need of moisture to help crop conditions this year.
