More than 70% of the country is still covered in drought. And while the latest winter storm was packed with needed moisture for some areas, it didn’t blanket every area needing moisture to restore depleted soils.
One Texas wheat farmer says rains and snows have been absent this year. Until this week, he hadn’t seen any measurable rainfall since he planted his wheat in November. And while those worries are sprouting concern for corn planting, which will start this month, he says his wheat crop is in very poor shape.
“It’s super dry, no subsoil moisture; it’s as dry as I’ve ever seen at this time of year at this stage,” says Todd Kimbrell, a farmer in Itasca, Texas. “In our last cold spell, we lost some tillers, some baby tillers. We have a real cold forecast coming Thursday morning. And if we don’t get moisture ahead of that, I’d say the wheat is pretty much toast. We’ve got cracks in our wheat, which maybe this has happened before, but I still don’t remember at this stage.”
Desperate for Moisture
The Kimbrells did see around an inch of moisture earlier in the week, but are now staring at sleet and brutally cold temperatures. He hopes the moisture was enough to save the wheat, but he says it’s too early to tell at this point.
“We planted early November, and we haven’t had a rain since right before we started that,” says Kimbrell. “We keep missing every little round of rain, and we’ll get just a trace, but in two weeks, we’ll be talking about planting corn here.”
Winter Wheat Worries
For wheat, the latest condition ratings for the crop fell last week, with the biggest hit in Kansas and Oklahoma.
In Kansas, just 30% of the crop is rated good to excellent, which is down 3 points from the start of the month.
In Texas, crop conditions are worse. None of the crop is rated to be in excellent condition, and only 6% is in good condition.
“I’m normally optimistic, but it is barely holding on,” says Kimbrell. “We’ve lost tillers, there’s a lot of dead foliage, burnt tips. It’s already stressed, and I just don’t see how it can handle the lower teens without moisture. And hopefully it’ll handle it with moisture.”
When Farm Journal interviewed him, he was doing drainage work in a field, which he says is unheard of for this time of year. And top soil moisture maps confirm the dryness concerns.
“I would say we need at least an inch and a half of rain prior to corn planting,” says Kimbrell. “Most places we won’t be able to get the corn up right now, which has happened maybe once in my career. I’ve seen it pretty dry when we were planting, but it wasn’t anywhere near this dry. It’s getting pretty crazy.”
Kimbrell says heading into the growing season, conditions are drier than area farmers experienced in 2011/2012.
