FARMER FOCUS: Extreme weather is the norm in Kansas
We farm under extreme conditions in the centre of the US; it is hard to appreciate unless you’ve seen it. In the time since I last wrote, we have had nine inches of rain.
We will have about half a corn crop because it has been too hot and dry during the last half of June and most of July. Scratching your heads about that? I’ll explain.
Some eight-and-a-half inches of that rain has come in the last five days, six-and-a-half came today (29 July) and five of it came between 7pm and 10.30pm tonight. Our TV weather report says Olpe, Kansas, nine miles north of my farm, had four-and-a-half inches of rain tonight in one hour.
Our saying here is we are never more than three hours from a flood, or three weeks from a drought, so even with water 18in deep in my corn, I will have a drought-damaged crop.
While this is not normal, it isn’t that unusual; the highest 24-hour rainfall I have seen on my farm was 14in from the night of 31 October 1998 to noon of 1 November.
My corn crop might be damaged, but there is still time for the soyabeans to make a decent crop since their reproductive stage is later than the corn.
The wheat crop in east central Kansas was probably the best ever, with yields up to 80 bushels/acre; an average yield is about 45. I didn’t have any wheat, but cut for a neighbour. His wheat was planted late and looked bad all winter and spring, but still made 65.
Harvest finished in the first few days of July, and most have been occupied with haying since July and August made from native grasses. Generally it will yield between one and two tons/acre, dry weather shortened yields a little this year.
The main farming news in my county will be the auction of 9,162 acres in 16 tracts from 80 to 1,383 acres on 16 August. See www.sundgren.com/our-auctions/.
The pictures will give a good idea of our terrain. I believe this will be the most acres ever auctioned at one time in Greenwood county.
Brian Hind farms 1,250ha of prairie land in Greenwood county, Kansas, America, of which 770ha is family owned plus the rest is rented. Of this, 330ha is arable cropping with maize, soya, grain sorghum, alfalfa plus a mix of rye, triticale and turnips for grazing by 200 beef cattle. Grassland is used to produce hay.
Read more from Arable Farmer Focus writers
