Ron Suppes has been praying about rain for the past 10 years, asking God to send more precipitation for his wheat fields. Those prayers got answered this season, says the western Kansas farmer, based near Dighton.
“I’m not going to not pray for rain, but we’ve had enough that it’s kept us out of the field when we should be finished with wheat harvest about now,” he said on Tuesday.
Despite wheat harvest delays, Suppes says he’s happy about how area corn, soybeans, grain sorghum and pastures are looking now, especially for early July.
“They all look good here, but not as good as Iowa,” he notes. “I was through Iowa two weeks ago, and they’re way ahead of us. Of course, it’s always green there,” he laughs.
Iowa crops are off to a strong start this growing season, according to this week’s USDA Crop Progress Report. USDA rated 85% of the corn crop and 77% of the state’s soybean crop as good to excellent.
Weather conditions in much of the state have been favorable to crop growth and development.
In Washington County, Iowa, Mitchell Hora gave a two-word description of his corn crop. “It’s beautiful,” he told AgriTalk host Chip Flory.
Hora and Suppes shared their personal crop report Tuesday on AgriTalk. Listen here:
The Factor Driving Crop Conditions Across The U.S.
Nationally, USDA-NASS estimated that 73% of the corn crop and 66% of soybeans were in good-to-excellent condition in its weekly progress report released on Monday.
USDA cites favorable weather conditions for the positive ratings. The drought some meteorologists predicted last winter for parts of the central Midwest has not yet materialized.
“Nobody would have thought three months ago that we were going to have this much rain occurring across key crop areas, especially in the southern half of the Plains and in the Delta and Tennessee River Basin,” says Drew Lerner of World Weather, Inc.
The USDA Agricultural Weather Highlights issued July 2 acknowledges the favorable growing conditions.
“In the Corn Belt a lull in an overall wet pattern favors corn and soybean development, although a few showers are occurring west of the Mississippi River. The … mostly abundant moisture reserve is allowing earlier-planted corn and soybeans to enter reproduction without significant stress.”
What The Current Drought Monitor Shows
The U.S. Drought Monitor reported on June 24, 2025, that 25.83% of the U.S. and Puerto Rico were experiencing some degree of drought.
#DroughtMonitor 6/24: The Northwest and NV saw large degradations. Areas of the Rockies too.
— NIDIS Drought.gov (@NOAADrought) June 26, 2025
The Plains to the East mostly improved or remained drought-free. But small areas did worsen in the Plains, Midwest, FL.#Drought2025 Footprint: 25.8% of UShttps://t.co/mljsjQDvLB @NOAA pic.twitter.com/UInYEWmvVM
The percentage of crop acres experiencing some level of drought included 16% of corn acres, 12% of soybean acres and 3% of cotton acres.
Crops experiencing higher levels of drought conditions included 39% of the durum wheat acres, 29% of barley, 25% of spring wheat, and 20% of winter wheat acres.
Drought continues to build in the northern half of the High Plains, impacting rangeland and pastures, in particular, USDA reports.
For example, Montana led all states from the Rockies eastward with 47% of its rangeland and pastures rated in very poor to poor condition on June 29.
In the West, hot, mostly dry weather conditions have blanketed the regions for weeks
USDA says several Western wildfires remain active, and new fires could be ignited later on Tuesday by dry thunderstorms that are expected to occur from the Great Basin to the northern Rockies.
In the South, scattered showers are primarily confined to the lower Rio Grande Valley and areas east of the Mississippi Delta, according to USDA.
This season’s abundant rainfall has left pastures rated at least 80% good to excellent in several southern states, including Alabama, Kentucky, and North Carolina. However, frequent showers have also slowed many southern farmers’ fieldwork.
The Outlook For July Weather
John Hoomenuk of EmpireWeather.com anticipates farmers in the Central Plains will see drier, hotter conditions this month.
“Most of the long-range data we’re seeing, if you look at July as a whole, is showing some pretty substantial [temperature] numbers in the Central Plains. We’re talking somewhere between four and five degrees above normal in some areas of Kansas and Nebraska, two or three degrees above normal for the month on average, surrounding that in parts of southwestern Iowa and the Dakotas,” he says.
As for states further east, such as Indiana, Michigan and Ohio, Hoomenuk says farmers there will likely see temperatures “closer to normal” for July, based on data he’s reviewed.
“It doesn’t seem like we’ll get into that long-term heat there in those eastern regions of the U.S, so the concern level out there is pretty low right now heading into July,” he says.
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