By PAMELA ROBINSON, Register Staff Writer
With rain continuing to come down, and moisture already seeming to soak the ground here in Cooke County, people are wondering how local crops are being affected.
With the Cooke County Production Income report reflecting the dramatic drop in crop production in 2009, farmers, ranchers and others are hoping for a more favorable and profitable year in 2010.
“We have had excessive moisture so far this year,” Cooke County AgriLife Extension Agent Wayne Becker confirmed. “Farmers have been waiting for the ground to dry out enough to get their tractors and equipment back out in the fields.”
Becker said that at this time of year, existing crops should be be fertilized again so yields are not affected even more, and new crops need to be planted. The problem is, those growing crops can’t get their tractors and equipment out in the fields in wet weather.
Becker said 2010 has been a wet year — a condition which definitely affects crop yields. Crops raised in Cooke County include wheat, oats, corn, ensilage, hay, sorghum, soybeans, barley and pecans.
Each type of crop has its own schedule which includes time to plant, fertilize and harvest. Crops are also affected differently by the excessive moisture, Becker said. If the window closes on the timeframe for a particular crop, that’s a problem.
For example, wheat and oats are planted in the fall.
“They fertilize wheat again now,” Becker said. “So, not much of the rye grass, wheat has been fertilized, and that’s an issue. That can cause some loss of production for wheat...it will certainly hurt yields...it’s going to start to impact yields soon.”
Becker said that in a wet spring, wheat growers also worry about crop diseases.
“Wheat doesn’t like the wet weather and will lead to the development of rust, which is a wheat disease,” he continued. “It’s the same for oats and barley.”
Corn is another crop with a timeframe not being met.
“By now, people would be well on their way, almost finished with corn,” Becker noted, “but no one has started planting corn because it’s too muddy, so if they don’t get it done pretty quick, we may not have any corn put in the ground. Because here it gets hot so quick and the heat, if you can’t get that corn growing ahead of the heat, it just doesn’t produce well. We grow about 2,000 acres of corn generally.
“If it dried up today, they could probably still plant corn,” he said. “They could get a lot of fertilizer put out on their wheat and their oats, which is still in time to help it significantly. However, yields start to be reduced soon, especially for grain and even hay.”
Becker said that the next crops to be planted will be milo and sorghum, in April.
“But, they can’t get the field ready and that’s the problem,” Becker noted.
Even gardeners are hampered by the excessive moisture this year, Becker said. “They can’t get in the garden, it’s too muddy.” At least they can put on their muck boots and get some of their garden in.
Becker said the good news about the excess moisture is that the soil has a lot of moisture in it and the ponds are full. For those with pasture land, too much moisture is better than not enough.
A good resource to use to check the local moisture level is the National Oceanic Atmospheric Administration website at www.NOAA.gov. Becker said the website can provide useful information.
“Weather is always a primary factor in the crop yield. It’s always something weather-wise. When you’re in agriculture, the weather is just tough to deal with. You either don’t have enough moisture or you have too much. To some degree it looks better being really wet than what we had last year,” Becker noted. “We’ll just have to wait and see how it all plays out.”
