Flood

USDA to Provide $1 Billion to Flood and Wildfire-Impacted Livestock Producers

Mon, 15 Sep 2025 14:16:07 GMT

U.S. Secretary of Agriculture Brooke L. Rollins announced Sept. 12 eligible livestock producers will receive disaster recovery assistance through the Emergency Livestock Relief Program for 2023 and 2024 Flood and Wildfire (ELRP 2023 and 2024 FW) to help offset increased supplemental feed costs due to a qualifying flood or qualifying wildfire in calendar years 2023 and 2024. The program is expected to provide approximately $1 billion in recovery benefits.

Sign-up begins on Monday, Sept. 15. Livestock producers have until Oct. 31 to apply for assistance.

“We are providing continued support for livestock producers whose livelihoods and way of life have been disrupted by catastrophic floods, wildfires, and poor forage conditions in 2023 and 2024. Under President Trump’s leadership, USDA is standing shoulder to shoulder with America’s farmers and ranchers, delivering the resources they need to stay in business, feed their families, and keep our food supply strong,” Rollins says. “This announcement builds on the Supplemental Disaster Relief Program (SDRP) and the historic levels of assistance we have rolled out over the last few months, once again proving that this administration is working as quickly as possible to get help out the door and into the hands of livestock and dairy producers. USDA will continue to put farmers first and ensure they have the relief they need to weather storms and build for the future.”

Qualifying Disaster Events

To streamline program delivery, FSA has determined eligible counties with qualifying floods and qualifying wildfires in 2023 and 2024. For losses in these counties, livestock producers are not required to submit supporting documentation for floods or wildfires. A list of approved counties is available at fsa.usda.gov/elrp .

USDA explains for losses in counties not listed as eligible, livestock producers can apply for ELRP 2023 and 2024 FW but must provide supporting documentation to demonstrate that a qualifying flood or qualifying wildfire occurred in the county where the livestock were physically located or would have been physically located if not for the disaster event. FSA county committees will determine if the disaster event meets program requirements.

Livestock and Producer Eligibility

For ELRP 2023 and 2024 FW, FSA is using covered livestock criteria similar to the Livestock Forage Disaster Program (LFP) which includes weaned beef cattle, dairy cattle, beefalo, buffalo, bison, alpacas, deer, elk, emus, equine, goats, llamas, ostriches, reindeer and sheep.

Wildfire assistance is available on non-federally managed land to participants who did not receive assistance through LFP or the ELRP 2023 and 2024 for drought and wildfire program delivered to producers in July of this year.

Payment Calculation

Eligible producers can receive up to 60% of one month of calculated feed costs for a qualifying wildfire or three months for a qualifying flood using the same monthly feed cost calculation that is used for LFP.

ELRP 2023 and 2024 for drought and wildfire and ELRP 2023 and 2024 FW have a combined payment limit of $125,000 for each program year. Producers who already received the maximum payment amount from ELRP 2023 and 2024 for drought and wildfire will not be eligible to receive an additional payment under ELRP 2023 and 2024 FW. Eligible producers may submit form FSA-510, Request for an Exception to the $125,000 Payment Limitation for Certain Programs, to be considered for an increased payment limit of $250,000.

Supplemental Disaster Assistance Timeline

The press release says USDA is fully committed to expediting remaining disaster assistance provided by the American Relief Act, 2025. On May 7, USDA launched its 2023/2024 Supplemental Disaster Assistance public landing page where the status of USDA disaster assistance and block grant rollout timeline can be tracked. The page is updated regularly and accessible through fsa.usda.gov . Contact your local FSA county office for more information.

When Farmers Can Expect the Next Round of American Relief Act Payments

Tue, 03 Jun 2025 13:51:12 GMT

USDA is currently in the trenches of issuing the nearly $31 billion in total disaster and emergency relief aid to farmers and ranchers in four stages. That money was appropriated by Congress as part of the American Relief Act, which was passed in December of 2024. In an exclusive interview with Farm Journal on Monday, USDA Deputy Undersecretary Brooke Appleton said the next round of disaster aid payments could be coming the first full week of July.

USDA began issuing the $1 billion in emergency livestock relief program payments last week, which is the latest in a series of disaster and emergency relief. Appleton told Farm Journal that instead of holding the money and issuing it all at once, USDA decided to issue the payments in four phases, as USDA wanted to get assistance out to producers as quickly as possible.

“We had ECAP (Emergency Commodity Assistance Program) , we now have the Emergency Livestock Relief Program, we’re going to have supplemental disaster relief, and then we’re going to have another emergency livestock relief program to cover the flood losses that we saw in ‘23 and ’24,” Appleton said. “So, we’re kind of doing it in stages, it should stream out all through the summer really, and so I’m hoping that that kind of can relieve some of that financial stress.”

Appleton said USDA has issued $7.7 billion out of the appropriated $10 billion in direct payments under ECAP so far, which was the first stage of payments. Sign-ups for that program began in March. USDA initially issued 85% of a producer’s projected payment, with the remaining 15% expected after sign-ups close on Aug. 15.

Just last week, USDA announced the details surrounding $1 billion in Emergency Livestock Relief Program payments , which is the second phase of the American Relief Act. Those payments are being dispersed now, and it covers grazing losses due to eligible drought or wildfire events that happened in 2023 and 2024. That round of the program doesn’t require producers to sign up, as USDA is using existing information. Since the program was announced on May 29, USDA says it’s dispersed more than $641 million in payments to livestock producers who suffered grazing losses during that time.

“FSA is leveraging existing livestock forage disaster program data to streamline these payments and calculations to expedite that relief. So this was unlike most of our programs, farmers and ranchers didn’t have to go into the office to sign up,” Appleton said. “We already have the information. So those emergency relief payments were automatically issued to producers who had already had their data into their FSA office. And those payments started going out in earnest last week, so May 30.”

The next round of American Relief Act disaster aid payments is the Supplemental Disaster Relief Program, which is the larger amount appropriated by Congress. Appleton told Farm Journal details surrounding those payments are being prepared now, and USDA expects to issue those payments next month. The amount of money that will go out during the next round isn’t known at this time, as a USDA official says the agency is still “working diligently to balance the needs with the available funding.”

“The larger supplemental disaster program that is part of that is making its way through the process right now at USDA and other government agencies,” Appleton said. “The timeline for that, we’re targeting to sign up farmers by the first full week in July, so maybe the week of July 7. That will be literally every crop production loss that has happened for ‘23 and ’24, and that’s just additional disaster assistance that was legislated by Congress.”

Once those payments are released, USDA’s final phase of the American Relief Act will be another emergency livestock relief program, but this covers flood losses producers saw in 2023 and 2024.

Appleton says that’s been the most difficult program to outline and detail, as USDA has never administered a disaster program for livestock that covered losses due to flooding.

“We’ve never had a disaster program for livestock that triggered on flooding, so that piece of it is going to take us a little bit longer,” she said. “And that’s something that’s another piece of this larger disaster package. It’s going to roll out later this summer, but as these programs are ready to go and ready to roll out, we’re focused on doing it as soon as we can, rather than holding them all and doing it all at once. We want to make sure as soon is the assistance is ready to go, we are getting it out and we’re getting it to the folks who need it.”

Congress earmarked $2 billion for livestock losses due to droughts, wildfires and floods. The first livestock disaster aid announced last week totaled $1 billion, which means another $1 billion should be dispersed through the livestock disaster payments that cover losses due to flooding.

USDA says it is fully committed to expediting remaining disaster assistance provided by the American Relief Act 2025. On May 7, it launched its 2023/2024 Supplemental Disaster Assistance public landing page where the status of USDA disaster assistance and block grant rollout timeline can be tracked.

Rollins Says USDA Will Announce Application Process for $21 Billion in Disaster Aid Within Days

Wed, 07 May 2025 18:44:03 GMT

In her first hearing on Capitol Hill since the confirmation process earlier this year, Secretary Brooke Rollins faced the Senate Appropriations Committee on Tuesday, fielding questions on everything from USDA’s bold budget cuts and frozen funding to the fate of the nearly $21 billion in disaster aid.

Rollins fiercely defended the cuts, continuing to argue that it is a way to make USDA more effective and more efficient. She also told the committee that farmers will be able to sign up for the disaster aid by the end of May.

Congress approved the disaster aid on Dec. 21, 2024. While the $10 billion in Emergency Commodity Assistance Program (ECAP) was passed the same day, it was separate and came with a clear deadline on when USDA had to disperse those funds. In the hearing this week, Rollins admitted the disaster aid program has been more complicated to roll out.

“That one’s a little more complicated than the ECAP, the disaster or the emergency relief payments, but we’re really close and within a matter of days or weeks, certainly by the end of this month, that money will begin moving,” Rollins said on Tuesday.

The nearly $21 billion in disaster aid targets agricultural losses from natural disasters in 2023 and 2024, which includes:

Droughts
Hurricanes
Floods
Wildfires
And other extreme weather events.

Of those funds, $2 billion is earmarked for livestock losses attributed to droughts wildfires and floods. There is also an allocation of $220 million that will be distributed through block grants to smaller agricultural states with limited farm income and acreage.

“We are within days of announcing the application process,” Rollins said. “Of course, that’s a little more complicated because we don’t have the specifics, and it isn’t, as [Sen. John Hoeven, R-N.D.] mentioned, in North Dakota, 15,794 of your farmers and ranchers have received money through that first tranche, through the first $10 billion, the emergency aid. On the weather-related programs, that application opens in the next week or two. And we will be moving very, very quickly.”

.@SecRollins testifies before Congress: "When farmers prosper, rural America prospers." pic.twitter.com/rXwV12JPDD
— Rapid Response 47 (@RapidResponse47) May 6, 2025

According to Pro Farmer, the disaster aid is intended to cover losses in revenue, production quality, and infrastructure for crops, livestock and timber. And most of the aid is expected to be administered through USDA’s Emergency Relief Program (ERP), which has been used for similar disaster relief in previous years. However, USDA has indicated the new program will be more farmer-friendly than the Biden administration’s implementation of the last ag disaster funds.

Rollins says the rollout of the disaster aid funds is “a long time coming,” bacause it is related to disasters that happened as long as two years ago.

“And so ensuring that we get that out as quickly as we possibly can with the team that we have in place,” Rollins said. “I’m really proud of, I believe, how efficiently and how quickly the team moved out that first tranche. And I believe that you’ll see the same sort of efficiency and effectiveness with the second tranche, so it’s within the coming weeks.”

Rollins Fiercely Defends Cuts at USDA

Also in the hearing, Rollins defended recent budget and DOGE cuts, saying her team is eliminating what she called wasteful DEI spending, fraud and abuse in all USDA programs. She argued the plan is to rebuild USDA to put farmers first.

Rollins also discussed some frozen funds at the agency and when a review of them will be completed.

“We are working around the clock, going line by line, we’re down to the final 5 billion out of, I believe, almost 20 billion of frozen funds, but $5 billion is a lot of money,” Rollins said. “And when you think about that in terms of grant or contract and moving that out quickly, we’re very helpful to keep moving through that very, very quickly and have that done very soon.”

Rollins was also asked about the 15,000 USDA employees who have taken buyout offers from the federal government . Reports show that accounts for nearly USDA’s total workforece, and impacts farmer-facing agencies such as Natural Resources Conservation Service and Farm Service Agency.

“The 15,000 number, it is less than 15% of our total workforce,” Rollins said. “I realize that’s still a very, very big number. But I think it’s important to realize in the context that every year USDA, through attrition loses between 8,000 and 10,000 employees. So, it’s a massive government agency, but they’re refilled. Well, and that’s what we are looking to refill. The front liners, that’s I was talking about right now. So whether it’s FSA, APHIS, the Wildland Firefighters, those are through a memorandum I just signed, we are actively looking and recruiting to fill those positions that are integral to the efforts and the key front line.”

Senator Patty Murray, D-Wash., followed up and asked, “So, you let people go, and you’re looking for new people to fill the positions that they had experienced in?”

“We’re having those discussions right now,” Rollins said. “We are working with all of you around the country, in your states. We believe our firefighters are operationally ready for wildfire season. Our FSA offices, we are making things more efficient, but bringing on new people that could potentially be a game changer in those offices.”

The workforce reduction is part of the federal government’s current Deferred Resignation Program (DRP), which is the voluntary program that allows eligible federal employees to resign in advance while continuing to receive pay and benefits until Sept. 30.

Rollins then clarified and explained the 15,000 USDA employees who accepted the buyouts, weren’t employees who were fired, they were resignations.

“None of those people were fired,” she added. “So, if they want to come back, and if they were in a key position, then we would love to have that conversation.”

Rollins said the latest round of DRPs, which happened in April, USDA didn’t accept some of the resignations, specifically if those employees were in what Rollins called “key positions,” which includes APHIS, FSA, etc.

“We are very intentionally approaching this,” she said. “Have we done it perfectly? No. Any type of whole scale change, and big effort to basically realign an entire government agency is difficult. And we know that, and we know it hasn’t been perfect, but we’re working every day to solve for a lot of this, and I think we’re making a lot of really good progress.”

USDA Spends $400 Million a Day on Food Assistance Programs

The other hot button topic during the hearing was food assistance. The secretary pointed out USDA spends more than $400 million a day on food assistance programs and said ending COVID-era funding programs doesn’t mean defunding food assistance.

You can listen to her pointed comments in the video below.

USDA alone spends $400+ MILLION each day on food assistance programs.

Ending COVID-era funding programs doesn’t defund food assistance. It ensures we’re good stewards of taxpayer dollars. pic.twitter.com/3lT7Fu6or9
— Secretary Brooke Rollins (@SecRollins) May 6, 2025

Is The Planting Light Red, Green Or Yellow?

Tue, 08 Apr 2025 18:36:01 GMT

When the race to plant crops gets underway in your area this spring, take care to not stumble at the starting gate, advises Ken Ferrie, Farm Journal Field Agronomist.

One way to start strong is to evaluate weather and soil conditions to determine whether they’re signaling you have a red, green or yellow light for field work and planting.

“We don’t let the calendar, the coffee shop or neighbors dictate when we go to the field,” Ferrie says. “We do our own investigating and check all soil types, especially those in the lower topography parts of the field.”

Here are four considerations as you prepare for #planting2025:

1. Do The Ribbon Test
Jumping the gun with spring tillage and planting is costly. Ferrie points out that 80% of the compaction service calls he goes on each year can trace their roots back to the first pass the farmer made in the spring.

“Compaction put in by a field cultivator is a bad gift that keeps on giving all year long. You can’t take this gift back and get a redo,” he says.

Before you take off with spring tillage or plant, he advises checking conditions just under your tillage depth. It’s a practice that he calls making a soil ribbon.

Here are three simple steps to make a Soil Ribbon:

a. If you usually run a tillage tool 4” deep, take a shovel and dig down under that to about 5” deep.

b. Collect some soil in your hand and attempt to ball it up. If the soil is wet, it will readily ball up.

c. Once you get the soil balled up, squeeze it between your thumb and forefinger to see if you can make a ribbon about 1½” long.

“If you can make a ribbon, your tillage will not only put in a density change, but it will also put in a compaction layer. That’s a red light,” Ferrie says. “If you decide to move forward with tillage and planting, you probably will need to adjust your yield expectations later in the season as well as your marketing plan.”

Ferrie adds he has known growers who spent a lot of money and time the previous fall with deep tillage that got wiped out by one bad tillage pass the following spring. Don’t be that farmer this season.

2. Know the germ quality of your soybean and corn seed.

That can help you determine planting order or whether you need to check in with your seed supplier about making a product switch, notes Missy Bauer, Farm Journal Field Agronomist, based in south-central Michigan, near Coldwater.

Bauer says farmers are finding soybean seed is a mixed bag quality-wise this season, because of dry weather conditions that hammered much of the Midwest in 2024.

“Some of the seed that was harvested for soybeans last fall was under pretty dry conditions, 8%, 9% moisture, things like that,” she reports. “So, the seed quality this year has just been real up and down. We’ve had beans that are just awesome seed quality. And then we get another batch that comes in that’s got issues.”

For growers who might not have tested their soybean seed, she would say see what the cold germ scores are, because of the variation in quality.

“If you’re going to plant early, you want to know it can handle germinating in cold conditions, so we really encourage guys get seed tested,” she says.

With seed corn, if you have seed that tests on the lower end of saturated cold score ranges, Ferrie says to plant that seed once conditions will enable the crop to emerge in five to six days.

“You guys putting starter in-furrow, keep in mind that severe pericarp damage scores tend to lead to more starter burn issues,” he adds. “When it comes to corn stands, many issues are solved when we plant corn based on soil conditions and not the calendar. This could be your highest-yielding corn crop of your career. Let’s not shoot ourselves in the foot before we start.”

Here are some additional thoughts on how to Test Your Seed Before Planting To Avoid Quality Issues

3. Avoid Corn Seed Chilling

To avoid seed chilling, Ferrie advises farmers to plant corn only under two conditions. First, check to see that the soil temperature is 50 degrees F or higher, and second, you want a promising weather forecast in the days following planting.

“One of the challenges of planting in soils that are 45° or lower is seed chilling,” Ferrie says. “When the corn seed imbibes moisture, the temperature of the water it takes in has an effect on the seed itself. Water under 50° means that when swelling takes place the cells aren’t as elastic and they tear, which can cause disoriented mesocotyl, no sprouting, etc. It might not kill the plant completely but effects could show up in ear count.”

Corn requires approximately 120 accumulated growing degree days (GDDs) to emerge, under ideal conditions. To calculate GDDs, you can use this equation: GDD = (Daily Maximum Air Temperature + Daily Minimum Temperature)/2 – 50.

He says the first 48 hours after planting corn are most critical. Seed that is subject to cold during that period of time is most vulnerable to chilling. When that occurs, the metabolic reactions necessary for emergence don’t take place in a timely manner.

“Cold seed corn is unable to swell in the ground with the same elasticity as it’s able to achieve with soil temperatures at 50° F or warmer,” Ferrie explains.

When corn emergence isn’t timely, yield potential is docked and you won’t get it back.

“Chilling can eliminate between 10% and 20% of your yield potential,” says Ferrie “You’ll never see that loss driving down the road, but you will if you stretch a tape measure for ear counts.”

4. Plant Soybeans Ahead Of Corn
If your weather conditions and soil temperatures turn unfavorable for corn, consider whether you can plant soybeans.
If the ground is fit, Ferrie would give farmers a green light to plant their full-season soybeans. Ferrie says Group 4s, mid-Group 3 and late-Group 3 soybeans need about 950 growing degree days (GDDs) pre-solstice. Early to mid-Group 3 soybeans need about 810 GDDs.

“We try to get those fuller season beans planted here by April 18,” he says. “With those earlier Group 3s and later Group 2s, maybe shoot for the planting timeframe of April 25 to May 4.”

For more insights on picking the right maturity for your soybean planting window, Ferrie recommends checking out the information from Crop-Tech Consulting Agronomist Matt Duesterhaus. You can find his recommendations here .

Your next read: 300-Bu. Corn Has a Big Appetite for N, P and K

60% Drought Risk? The Latest Forecast For The 2025 Growing Season

Tue, 01 Apr 2025 20:28:06 GMT

Spring has officially sprung and that means heavy rains are on the way, specifically from eastern Texas into Ohio this week. Any fieldwork and planting will come to a halt, and Nutrien’s principal atmospheric scientist Eric Snodgrass warns of significant flooding risk.

“We’ve got a swath of the country that could pick up anywhere between 5” to upward of 12” of rainfall,” he told “AgriTalk” host Chip Flory on Tuesday. “In the Ohio River and in the lower Mississippi River, there’s going to be a major flood trend.”

USDA meteorologist Brad Rippey says there’s a chance for even higher totals in some areas.

“There are some indications we could see totals up in the 18" range likely across Arkansas on into parts of northwestern or northern Kentucky before this is all said and done,” Rippey told AgDay’s Michelle Rook.

Meteorologists have been warning of drought conditions for months now, so this type of weather system should have a positive impact, right? Wrong – Snodgrass explains this is the wrong time, wrong place.

“This is not a place where we’re missing out on moisture. This is the place we saw flood back in early March and even in parts of February,” he says.

The good news is snow is in the forecast for some areas in need of moisture, such as parts of the Dakotas and Minnesota. But unfortunately, it likely won’t be enough.

“The central United States is at about a 60% drought risk. Some of the best weather forecast models we have out there are trying to put the epicenter of that drought somewhere between Missouri, Nebraska, South Dakota, Iowa and southern Minnesota by the time we get into July and August,” Snodgrass says. “When you think about those particular states, developing drought from spring to summer in any year is somewhere in the neighborhood of 28% to 38%. Essentially, the risk is doubled this year.”

Snodgrass explains the canary in the coalmine for a drought will come from a combination of the Gulf of Alaska ocean temperatures and the Bermuda high, which is an area of high pressure that can influence weather patterns and tropical systems. If the Gulf of Alaska ocean temperatures begin dropping this summer, it’s a bad sign.

“If in June we start to watch the Gulf of Alaska ocean temperatures drop, that’s actually symptomatic of the atmosphere losing momentum. And if it loses momentum, there’s nothing to keep the Bermuda high over Bermuda,” he says.

What It Means For Planting
With flooding in the East and drought in the West, Snodgrass plans to use the Mississippi River as his main moisture boundary this year.

“If you’re east of it, I think spring is super tight. If you’re west of it, we have got to return moisture to Kansas, Oklahoma, Texas and Nebraska in order to beat back any sort of risk of drought going forward,” he says. “I really just think it’s West versus East this year on who’s got the favorable conditions early versus the risk in the middle of the season.

Taking a closer look at that outlook for a wet spring in the East, Snodgrass specifically says the month of April is shaping up to be one week on and then one week off.

“Right now, we’re week on with heavy rains. Next week, we get cooler and drier. Week three in April goes right back into an active pattern,” he explains. “What I want to know is if week four of April brings in cold conditions right after Easter. If that occurs, we just threw the brakes on any early planting hopes. Right now though, it appears that most of spring would favor tighter windows in the East.”

Despite the current outlook, a challenging spring and dry summer doesn’t mean game over.

“Any sort of problem we thought we saw will be gone in a heartbeat with good July rainfall. We are not settled. There’s a lot to understand and change with this pattern,” Snodgrass says. “Let’s say we do have drought, but you don’t have the heat stress. We can make a huge crop in drought conditions, so don’t forget that.”

Your Next Read: Planter Calibration Sets Up Your Season For High Corn Yields

A Warming Trend Is On The Way For Early March

Wed, 26 Feb 2025 22:01:55 GMT

If early March weather rolls out the way some ag industry experts are predicting, farmers might be tempted to break out their shorts and sunscreen.

“It’s going to be warm, very warm for most of March,” Shawn Hackett, president of Hackett Financial Services said on the latest Moving Iron podcast, with Host Casey Seymore.

Above average temperatures for much of the U.S. are in the forecast for March 2-6, 2025.

(NOAA)

What’s at play currently, Hackett said, is a sudden stratospheric warming (SSW) event that could take temperatures a notch higher than usual during the next few weeks.

Hackett said the polar stratosphere is in the middle stages of developing what he called “one of the top five strongest sudden stratospheric warming events” he’s ever seen going into early March.

“The stratosphere, which normally is super cold, gets displaced and you get this extreme warming above the North Pole. When that happens, then the entire stratosphere gets unstable and starts to lose its cohesiveness,” explained Hackett, whose interest in the weather is fueled by what it can mean to grain markets.

His hope, in fact, is that the weather in early March could be a positive catalyst for grain markets. “It could offer a tremendous cash selling opportunity not only for the old crop but maybe even for the new crop that’s coming along,” Hackett said.

Maybe A Short-Lived Weather Pattern?
But don’t expect higher temperatures to persist beyond the next few weeks. There will likely be colder conditions coming in right behind them by late March to early April, according to Ag Meteorologist Drew Lerner, founder and owner of World Weather, Inc.

Lerner told AgriTalk Host Chip Flory earlier this week he believes two things will come out of the current weather pattern and then go through spring.

First, Lerner believes the moisture availability in the upper Midwest and parts of the western Corn Belt will continue to be lighter than normal, which will encourage farmers to plant.

Second, he believes the risk of late-season frost and freeze across corn and soybean country will be much higher in 2025 than it has been in recent past years.

“We may see a period like right now, where we warm up nicely, and crops will take advantage of that and really get going aggressively. Then, we could turn around and bring a cold wave in and knock those crops down,” Lerner told Flory. “That’s one of my biggest concerns for spring, besides the dryness we already mentioned in the western Corn Belt.

Conditions in the West, Southwest and portions of the Midwest are going to continue to be dry, as March gets underway.

(Eric Snodgrass, U.S. Meterologist)

“I do think, though, with that aside, we will see aggressive planting this spring in the western and central parts of the Midwest, because I don’t think we’re going to have so much moisture around that we can’t be that way,” Lerner added.

Beware Of Frost And Freeze
Hackett’s prediction for April weather coincides with Lerner’s concerns. Going back to his prediction for a sudden stratospheric warming in early March, Hackett said that what often follows an SSW about 45 days later is a cooling off trend.

“You have the potential for some very cold, wintry type of weather that can easily bring in a hard freeze. That should create a considerable amount of unfavorable planting season, either delayed planting or planting that gets done and gets frozen over and replanting winter wheat that gets frost as it comes out of dormancy,” Hackett said.

Ken Ferrie recalls farmers in western Illinois were planting early soybeans by March 21 in 2024. He encouraged farmers who want to plant early to exercise some caution.

“An important consideration is whether you have crop insurance,” said Ferrie, Farm Journal Field Agronomist.

For farmers in the Eastern Corn Belt, Lerner said he doesn’t believe they will be able to plant as quickly as their western brethren because of excess moisture the region has received through the Ohio Valley and is likely to continue to get this spring.

Expect Temperatures To ‘Bounce Around’
As for temperatures, Lerner believes they will average close to normal but will bounce around this spring. “So we’ll be warm, and then we’ll get cold, and we’ll go back into warm again,” he said.

Flory asked Lerner whether he would put some odds on the potential for drought conditions this summer.

“I’d say that we probably have a 25% to 30% chance that we could have a more serious dryness problem in the West. But I am being conservative with that, possibly. I really want to see what happens over these next three to four weeks,” Lerner said.

“There’s no meteorologist out there that I know of that’s ever predicted a bad drought in the summer this far in advance, and I’m not going to be the first one,” Lerner added. “I’ll leave that up for somebody else.”

You can hear Lerner’s conversation with Chip Flory here:

California Dairy Farmers Prayed for Rain – Now It’s Forcing Some to Evacuate

Fri, 27 Sep 2024 01:29:10 GMT

Not long ago, California dairy producer Ryan Junio prayed for rain. The ongoing water scarcity challenges that faced the Golden State was the No. 1 concern for this Tulare County dairy farmer.

“As a dairy producer, water scarcity is an ever-growing challenge and is my top concern,” Junio said last summer.

Junio wouldn’t have thought that nine months later he would be dealing with a different water crisis, as massive flooding has wreaked havoc on California’s largest dairy hub, Tulare County, home to 330,000-plus dairy cows. Recently Junio’s farm, Four J Jerseys, which consists of two dairies located in Pixley and home to 4,200 cows, had to evacuate one dairy that sits south of the Tule River.

“We have managed to keep the corrals dry, but we have water on three sides of us,” Junio said on Sunday afternoon. “With another storm coming, we are trying to be proactive and moved cows back to the home dairy in a safe area and took heifers to our heifer ranch, along with one of our neighbors.”

Relocating cows from their second dairy to the home dairy hasn’t been a small task.

“We turned nine 500-cow freestall pens into 600-cow freestall pens at the home dairy,” Junio explained. “The carrousel can handle it, but I had to switch my cows from 3x to 2x milking.”

Geoff Vanden Heuvel, the director of regulatory and economic affairs with the California Milk Producer Counci,l said flooding in Southern San Joaquin Valley has caused the evacuation of a small number of dairies with another dozen or so where the flooding could necessitate evacuation.

“We are really in the early stages of this situation,” he says. “Two of the flood control lakes, Success and Kaweah, are full which greatly reduces their ability to control the amount of water that gets released from them. If we have a rapid snow melt, the flows from those lakes could greatly increase the flooding which would threaten the dairies in those areas.”

Back in Pixley, Four J heifers were also relocated, spread out across their heifer ranch and nearby vacant corrals. They also pulled all the commodities out of their commodity barns, moving it to safe ground. However, Junio reports he still has alfalfa hay in that barn and 6,000 tons of silage at that dairy.

“We were proactive and got things moved before damage has been done to our facility,” Junio shares.

Their cropland is also not faring well.

“Several thousands of acres are under water as the river continues to overflow in restricted areas,” he says. “However, there are several other dairies up and down the stream from us in much worse shape.”

According to Junio, this is just the Tule River situation. South of their other facilities is Deer Creek and that has wreaked havoc as well for anyone along it.

Junio is thankful that his milk continues to be picked up and shares that his Land O’Lakes field representative told him that they are barely able to pick up milk from other farms.

“It is simply a mess,” he says. “I think all of us out west collectively prayed at the same time for water and it bit us in the rear.”

For more California flooding coverage, read:

From Fresh Berries to Lettuce, What We Now Know About the Agricultural Losses Caused by Flooding in California

Will the U.S. Corn Crop Bake In the July Heat? What You Need to Know About the July Forecast

Wed, 03 Jul 2024 20:03:38 GMT

The possibility of a hot summer has been advertised for months. As meteorologists watched the transition from El Niño to La Niña, the thought it would be a hot summer, but also dry in the southern tier of the U.S., dominated conversations.

Now that July is here, and the market is focused on the forecast, it’s been an extremely wet start for the heart of the Midwest, with flooding issues along both the Missouri and Mississippi rivers. In fact, 18 gauges along the Upper Mississippi River are at major flood stage, and the Missouri River continues to swell with more heavy rainfall this week.

With eyes on the forecast for July, one ag meteorologist says it looks fairly favorable for much of the Midwest.

“I think we’ll make it through without really critical heat, that’s the way it looks to me, with a lot of heat staying west, south and east of the heart of the Corn Belt,” says Brad Rippey, USDA meteorologist. “One wild card will be the Atlantic Tropic basin — incredibly active already so early this season. That could infuse some moisture into the southern and eastern United States, possibly even the Midwest, as we move forward. As we know from past years, even dry year soybeans can benefit from late rain. So that’s something we’ll be keeping an eye on.”

Rain Chances in July

National Weather Service (NWS) Climate Prediction Center (CPC) recently released its 30-day precipitation and temperature outlook . NOAA is forecasting below normal precipitation in the Pacific Northwest and down really through the central and southern Plains, above normal in the upper Corn Belt and along the eastern seaboard.

Rippey says he agrees with NOAA’s 30-day outlook, especially considering the ridge parked across the country that will create more chances for rain.

“We’ve got this ridge that’s pretty well established. It’s going to move from day to day, but that is going to allow some Gulf and Atlantic moisture to work its way into these cold fronts. There’s also going to be a component where the ridge is strong enough that it doesn’t allow the cold fronts and moisture to reach into other areas. And so we are going to be seeing that drying trend across parts of the northern tier, Pacific Northwest, and on into the parts of the northern Plains and Upper Midwest, little bit drier, but then there’s still should be plenty of moisture.”

Rippey says the active weather pattern will continue throughout early July.

“From the standpoint of the Upper Midwest, maybe a little bit of bad news, but for just about everybody else, there could be some good news in this July forecast with some scattered to widespread showers,” he says.

According to USDA’s weekly crop progress report, 11% of the nation’s corn crop is already silking, 5 points ahead of average. The crops need moisture but also not too high of heat. But Eric Snodgrass, science fellow and principal atmospheric scientist for Nutrien Ag, says some areas need a break from the wet weather right now, but they could also use some heat units.

“Honestly, if we can get a little bit of drier weather into the northern Plains and Upper Midwest after this, no one’s going to complain. And on top of that, we need some heat in that area, as well. So, some of the crops are behind in the North,” Snodgrass says.

Snodgrass points out the area he’s worried about the most is the southern Plains.

“If you take a look at that particular map, you notice I’ve got this dry bullseye somewhere around, Texas to Kansas, maybe back over toward Arkansas and parts of Missouri, and given the fact we’ve got such warm ocean temperatures in the North Pacific and in the North Atlantic, historically, that tends to anchor a ridge that sits right in that particular part of the country. So, it’s always a situation every summer of who’s stealing rain from someone else, right? When it comes to the way the pattern sets up, what I just worry is what if it gets stagnant at some point late July or to August? But overall, I think the CPC’s got a pretty good handle on what we think we might see for July.”

The July Heat

What about the heat? Much of the U.S. is expected to see above normal temperatures throughout July, according to NOAA’s 30-day outlook. However, Rippey thinks the core of the Corn Belt won’t bake like the map leads you to believe.

“You notice the little donut hole that is really focused across some major production areas of the Midwest. And that is, I think, the key to this July temperature outlook,” Rippey says. “If you picture the ridge of high pressure that’s been dominating this early summer, think of it as the top of a trampoline. Somebody jumping on that trampoline just kind of bouncing away. That would be the cold fronts trying to knock away the top of this ridge. The Climate Prediction Center thinks that it will be enough, bouncing on this ridge to keep temperatures down a little bit across the Upper Midwest, maybe extending on into other parts of the Corn Belt. That would be good news.”

30-day temperature outlook

(CPC )

Rippey says with 11% of the corn crop silking at the end of June, the early July forecast is a critical time for those crops.

“High probabilities above normal temperatures as you move into the western U.S. That is probably going to be true for the Deep South and parts of the East as well,” Rippey says. “So the real question becomes, how much can we keep this ridge knocked down during the critical month of July.”

Last summer was dry for much of the Midwest but also hot. However, the wildfire smoke provided a bit of a blanket to protect crops from the heat. Some agronomists and meteorologists argue last year’s weather proved the crops are more resilient to drought than they are heat.

This year, the West is already baking in consecutive days of triple-digit heat. Dallas-Fort Worth set a record this week for the highest minimum temperature with a reading of 83°F. That beat the previous record from 1998.

Snodgrass says those elevated nighttime temps are something to watch.

“That’s been a concern all season. We thought that this would be a year that was a hot summer, but a lot of that heat coming in overnight lows that were so very warm. If you can remember, when you keep the overnight lows so warm, you also pump out a bunch of moisture into this,” Snodgrass says.

He says the concern with the forecast is the lack of heat forecast for the Upper Midwest, including northern Iowa, Minnesota and South Dakota.

“We had farmers in those areas who had to replant in late May, early June,” Snodgrass says. “The issue there is that if you plant like 105-day corn in late May, your first frost date runs into before you’ll be black layer. And so, there’s some concern in that area. We need some heat, but just keep us under 92°F, right? And that’s going to be the trick as this goes forward.”

Flooding Creates Infrastructure and Transportation Headaches for Agriculture

Fri, 28 Jun 2024 16:23:35 GMT

The inundation of flood waters flowing through parts of Iowa, Minnesota and South Dakota are regional in nature but they are impacting the agricultural community beyond those three states, AgriTalk Host Chip Flory observed on Thursday

“Whenever we get into these events, we always think what this might be doing to our ability to move products and grains around the Midwest,” he said.

The 15 or so inches of rain that fell last weekend in northwest Iowa had an immediate impact on local infrastructures, causing rivers and even small streams to surge beyond their banks and cover roads, fields and even homesteads.

Then, there are scenarios that cause ripple effects that extend beyond a local geography. One of those, captured on video, was when the BNSF railroad bridge collapsed over the Big Sioux River on the South Dakota-Iowa state line.

A Burlington Northern Sante Fe spokesperson said in a prepared statement that trains that would use the bridge under normal conditions were being rerouted at Creston, Iowa.

“That’s in the south-central part of Iowa, three-thirds of the way down south in the state,” Mike Steenhoek, executive director of the Soy Transportation Coalition, told Flory. “All of a sudden, you’ve got additional freight and additional demand for the infrastructure in a different area, so you can see how a problem can extend from one area and then throughout an entire network,” he added.

Infrastructures Are Strained

Steenhoek told Flory that northwest Iowa, Minnesota, South Dakota and parts of Nebraska are responsible for a sizable portion of the country’s soybean processing capacity, which also increases the strain on rail systems.

“There are facilities there that are 365 days inbound and 365 days outbound, because they are processing soybeans,” he said.

“A lot of that freight ends up going over the very infrastructure – which has now been compromised – to the livestock industry or to the Pacific Northwest for export. This is going to have an impact on those products, which obviously is a concern for us,” Steenhoek added.

A Mix Of Conditions

As Steenhoek evaluated the condition of some of the major river systems on Thursday, he told Flory that the Missouri River is starting to recede. He expects that will continue – as long as little to no additional rainfall occurs in the near term.

On parts of the Mississippi River, water levels are high and flooding is underway in some areas as floodwaters move from northern areas and flow south.

The Scott County Emergency Management Agency, based in Davenport, Iowa, posted a notice online on Tuesday that residents need to prepare for potential flooding.

“Timing, river levels, and the possible impacts on Scott County still are not clear at this time,” the notice said. “Based on current information, river crest levels could be reached around July 4, 2024. Timing is contingent upon upcoming weather and rain.”

One silver lining, Steenhoek mentioned to Flory, is that as water flows away from the regions most affected by rainfall and flooding, there is usually more area within a river system to absorb surges of water.

For more insights on how flooding is impacting agriculture, listen to the complete discussion between Steenhoek and Flory on AgriTalk.

Double Trouble from Flooding and H5N1 hits Some Iowa Farms

Wed, 26 Jun 2024 13:17:15 GMT

Active flooding is still underway in parts of Iowa due to the more than 15 inches of rain that fell on parts of the state, particularly the northwest region, over the weekend, according to Iowa Secretary of Agriculture Mike Naig.

“There were folks literally being rescued off of rooftops and flown out of the flooded areas,” Naig told AgriTalk Host Chip Flory on Tuesday. “After a couple of days, we will be able to come in and start to get a sense of what the enormity of what’s happened is and the size of the impact on the ag landscape.”

The devastation led to a disaster proclamation from Iowa Gov. Kim Reynolds and the evacuation of thousands of Iowa residents from the area.

Naig said when he talked with Reynolds early Tuesday morning, she described the damage from the rains and flooding as “extensive.” The flooding is still underway, with rivers in north-central Iowa now starting to crest, according to the National Water Prediction Service.

Naig said state officials won’t have a full sense of the crop damage or number of livestock lost in the region until the flood waters recede.

“This was already a wet part of the state, where there were some challenges around planting and replanting. They’ve just been inundated with rain throughout the spring,” Naig said.

“What we’re hearing about, certainly, is damaged and destroyed equipment. There are livestock facilities that folks are having trouble getting feed to because of washed-out roads, and there are power outages and water outages. These are just some of the things that are really challenging.”

Added Stress On Dairies
For dairy producers in northwest Iowa, the floods arrived on top of challenges they already faced from dealing with cases of Highly Pathogenic Avian Influenza (H5N1) or efforts to prevent the occurrence of the disease.

“Unfortunately, a lot of our cases are in dairies up in that area,” Naig said. “Think of the added stress that those folks are experiencing right now.”

Naig said, in total, Iowa has confirmed 11 dairies and three poultry sites where H5N1 has been found.

“Don’t be surprised if you continue to hear about some additional cases in the state of Iowa, because here’s the point – we’re looking for it,” Naig said. “Our farmers are testing. Turns out, when you look for it, you can find it. I think this is a little wider spread than maybe what is just being confirmed.”

Naig said he commends the Iowa dairy industry for being proactive in reporting any positive cases. When cases are confirmed, he said the state can bring in a USDA epidemiological strike team to look for clues to how H5N1 is being transmitted.

“If we’re going to experience the pain of having positive cases, let’s learn as much as we can, so that we can craft biosecurity strategies to address those things that are found to be the cause of transmission,” he said.

Wide Range Of Symptoms And Outcomes
Naig added that the scope of H5N1 infections has varied between farms as well as in individual animals.

“I think maybe early on, folks said, ‘Oh, it’s really just a kind of a minimal milk production loss, and then everything gets back to normal.’ I don’t think it’s quite that way,” he said. “Some (producers) aren’t seeing clinical signs while others see acute infections and significant milk losses. We are also hearing about some cattle mortality, though it’s maybe because of a secondary infection or condition that actually causes that mortality.”

Naig told Flory he has asked USDA to provide compensation for animals that Iowa producers have had to cull or where death occurred.

“We continue to make that request because we are seeing some losses, but that’s still a work in progress,” he said. “And, of course, again, we’re trying to get research on the ground to determine how H5N1 is behaving. The other thing is we can’t treat this as a dairy disease. It is a dairy and a poultry issue. We’ve got to think about the larger livestock industry. That’s how we’re approaching it here.”

The conversation between Naig and Flory is available in its entirety below:

A Tale Of Two Crops: Farmers Struggle Against Flooding And Drought

Goodbye, El Niño. Hello, La Niña? The Big Transition to La Niña is Already Underway

A Tale Of Two Crops: Farmers Struggle Against Flooding And Drought

Tue, 25 Jun 2024 15:23:00 GMT

This week’s USDA crop progress report shows conditions continuing to decline for corn and soybeans. For corn, 69% is in good to excellent condition (down 3% from last week). The total soybean crop in good to excellent condition is also down 3% - from 70% last week to 67% this week.

And while some growers have severe drought to blame, others can point to extreme flooding.

This June has held two different extremes--

💧One of the wettest on record for the Upper Midwest/Northern Plains

☀️While being one of the driest on record for the Ohio Valley/Mid-Atlantic

👉The rest of the month? More rain for the Upper Midwest while drier than normal… pic.twitter.com/aWVZ1o5gsB
— BAM Weather (BAMWX) (@bamwxcom) June 23, 2024

In Iowa, growers might need to grab a life jacket before going to check their fields.

Abby and I went out and scouted a little bit of corn this afternoon. pic.twitter.com/yBBLsAjFkp
— Pete Crew. (Not the sharpest knife in the drawer). (@pete_90210) June 23, 2024

Last year we had 5.5" rain during growing season and this farm averaged 240 bu. This year 16" so far in May/June. pic.twitter.com/wOsGJsH4hm
— Living the dream (@NeIowaFarmer) June 22, 2024

Rock Valley, IA Flooding today. What a trainwreck pic.twitter.com/rumOfxyslQ
— Chris VB🐷🐖🌾🚤⛳ (@chrsvnbk) June 22, 2024

South Dakota farmers are having a similar experience - with this operation reporting 10" of rain in one day.

Water running into lake, yes my folks have house here! My farm is completely engulfed, can’t get within 15 miles. Animals safe, daughter safe we appreciate all of the kindness. Stay safe ❤️ pic.twitter.com/NvVMjqXDas
— ChelLewis (@LewisEQAcademy) June 24, 2024

The Oklahoma Pork Council has even started work to help those affected by the flood.

We are working to support our friends in the panhandle with food and other assistance as they recover from severe flash flooding. If you know of a direct need that our alliance of great community members can help meet, please give us a call or email us at kdeniz@okpork.org. pic.twitter.com/KT0meG0k5H
— Oklahoma Pork (@Okpork) June 19, 2024

But it seems the rain is only falling in one part of the country as farmers further east are hoping the skies open up soon.

Somewhere between the flood and us

It is just right pic.twitter.com/jUvV2wWBTY
— Stephen Ellis 190/58 (@sellis_1994) June 22, 2024

Hot Weather and Recent Dryness Create Favorable Conditions for Rapid Drought Development. https://t.co/UMw8lZcKJV pic.twitter.com/Unqb9Al6oa
— NWS Climate Prediction Center (@NWSCPC) June 24, 2024

Click here to let us know how your crops are progressing.

Flash Flooding Hits Texas Panhandle, Several Feedyards Now Face Massive Cleanup and Cattle Losses

Tue, 30 May 2023 18:18:41 GMT

From drought to now major flooding, historic rainfall fell in the Texas Panhandle over the weekend and prompted flooding. Hereford, Texas, is an area that was hit especially hard by the historic rains, with feedyards flooded and cattle trapped. Now, work is underway to pump a massive amount of water out.

According to the National Weather Service in Amarillo, the Hereford, Texas, area unofficially received 8 inches of rain in the past month. The heaviest rainfall event came Friday morning, with some volunteer observers showing 2.45 inches of rain fell in just 40 minutes.

@NWSAmarillo US Highway 385 is now being overtopped in the south side of Hereford. Water has come up approximately 5 feet in the last 30 min. Taken 9:20am pic.twitter.com/Gb1wCh49sT
— Brady Kendrick (@BradyKendrick24) May 27, 2023

According to John Robinson, senior vice president of membership and communications for the National Cattlemen’s Beef Association (NCBA), the water simply had nowhere to go, which prompted the flooding around Hereford. With such a quick rainfall event, there also wasn’t any advance notice that would have allowed residents to prepare.

“It’s flat topography down there. Once those creek beds that have been really dry for years fill up, there’s no place for that water to go. So that water spills over into low-lying areas adjacent to those creek beds. And it’s really caused a problem around the Hereford-Amarillo area down in the panhandle of Texas,” says Robinson.

The flooding impacted residential areas, and from an agricultural perspective, Hereford is also a major cattle production area and home to several feedyards.

“It’s one of the largest cattle feeding areas in the United States, so there are definitely widespread impacts,” says Robinson. “There’s probably going to be some production losses, some performance losses in terms of rate of gain, things like that.”

FLOODING IN HEREFORD continues. All of this water is headed to Buffalo lake and if/when it is full, the rest will head towards Palo Duro Canyon. Here is some video from @DowningMitchell #txwx #flooding #heavyrain @ABC7Amarillo @StormSearch7 @natwxdesk @NWSAmarillo pic.twitter.com/oLXi3x1AHU
— Corbin Voges WX (@CorbinVogesWX) May 27, 2023

Robinson points out while the short-term impact is painful for any feedyard dealing with the flooding, he says it shouldn’t create a big impact on cattle supply longer-term.

“It’s mostly going to work its way out here in the next few days,” he says. “There shouldn’t be supply chain increases, there shouldn’t be significant price increases. Who knows what else might happen in the meantime, but the impacts are going to be relatively short-lived for the vast majority of these areas.”

Major flooding in Hereford, TX following the overnight storm. Houses, cars, and semi-trucks under water as authorities work to divert citizens from the area. @ABC7Amarillo @StormSearch7 pic.twitter.com/GzY48iKqK7
— Mitchell Downing (@DowningMitchell) May 27, 2023

Some rumored estimates over the holiday weekend claimed 25,000 head of cattle died in the flooding, but NCBA says its representatives are in constant conversation with several producers in the area, and those estimates are way too high. NCBA says everyone is still trying to get a handle on losses, but it’s a fraction of the 25,000 number being thrown around.

Robinson says feedyards around Hereford are getting creative in pumping water out and cattle to dry ground.

“On one yard in particular, they brought in some dewatering pumps from oil drilling sites, maybe as far away as New Mexico. They’re pumping that water out, in some cases, over a mile to get it off of the feedyard so they can dry things out, get cattle to a safe, dry place to bed down,” he says.

Most of the water has receded in the Hereford area, but Robinson says there will be a lot of clean-up work that follows.

“While they’re trying to get all this other work done, they’re getting fences repaired, VDR pens repaired and dried. And it’s a lot of work. But there’s a committed crew of folks down there doing it, and not just from the agriculture industry, but from oil and gas and others as well,” says Robinson.

More precipitation could be on the way. Forecasts point to more severe weather—and heavy rains—which could cause further flooding.

Is Your Farm Prepared When Bad Weather Strikes?

Tue, 04 Apr 2023 18:57:37 GMT

Now that warmer temperatures are upon us, so is spring storm season. The wild display of weather this year has showcased flooding, tornadoes and more from coast to coast. This unpredictable weather underscores the importance of having a plan and be ready for whatever severe weather pattern could hit your farm.

Severe weather can be a detriment to your farm. Before bad weather hits, Country Financial offers the following tips to prepare your farm.

Take Inventory. Taking photos is a great way to inventory your belongings. Move cattle, feed, and equipment to higher ground in case of flooding, if possible. Stock up on extra farm supplies ahead of severe weather, like water and livestock feed.
Prepare Employees. Review emergency escape routes for each building. Remember this plan might differ depending on the weather event. Document procedures to account for employees. Create an emergency contact list for owners, employees, family members and supplies. Assign different roles and responsibilities to all employees, like who is responsible for calling emergency contacts.
Check Equipment. Ensure generators are in working order, turn off the propane supply at tanks and close any open chemical containers.
Check Insurance Protection. Meet with your insurance rep to ensure everything you own is properly protected. Also, discuss the process for filing a claim if a disaster strikes.

The Farm Bureau Financial Services offers these safety tips regarding tornados and flash flooding.

Tornadoes

On average, each year, 1,300 tornadoes are reported in the United States, and cause millions of dollars worth of damage. With winds that can reach over 250 miles per hour and the potential to travel up to 50 miles, tornadoes have a destructive potential that often puts them in the headlines. In the face of such a huge force of nature, what do you do?

Don’t remain in your tractor or vehicle. Find a low-lying area, such as a ditch, and cover your head with your arms to protect yourself from flying debris.
Don’t try to outrun a tornado with your vehicle.
Do have a plan for which buildings on your property provide the most protection. Basements are best, of course, but if you’re caught out during a tornado, a building with a strong inner structure, such as a barn, can be a safe haven. If you can, stay away from the outside walls of the building you take shelter in.

Flash Flooding

Intensifying rainfall has caused nearly multi billions in damage in the U.S. in the last few decades. Floods can be sudden and powerful, giving you little time to prepare. If you are confronted with flash flooding, there are a few tips to keep in mind:

Don’t attempt to drive through water over the road. You have no idea how deep it may be, and it only takes 6 inches of water to sweep a vehicle away.
Do avoid low-lying areas in your fields or on your property. During a torrential downpour, all that water has to go somewhere. You don’t want to be there when it arrives.
Do have an evacuation plan in place for your livestock, should you need to move them to higher ground.

California Flooding: We Need to Protect our Cows and our People

Tue, 28 Mar 2023 17:39:13 GMT

The challenges that face the Golden State have quickly changed from drought to massive flooding and played havoc with the central California agriculture landscape. This has forced several dairies in Tulare County to move their cattle to higher ground.

Kevin Abernathy, general manager for Milk Producers Council, recently told AgriTalk’s host, Chip Flory, that so many Californians are banning together to help with the water crisis and help relocate dairies.

“I am never more amazed and humbled at the triage that California dairy families do when we come across crises like this,” he says. “We have basically brought in construction companies and equipment on the site, as we built five-to-eight-foot moats around facilities.”

California has had to relocate thousands upon thousands of cattle, as well as feed. Abernathy shared that one 15,000-cow dairy had to move 3,500 heifers off a feedlot, as well as 27 truckloads of feed away from the impacted area. Additionally, this farm has 3,000 acres of winter forage wheat crop under water.

“We haven’t had to experience this since the mid-80s,” Abernathy said. “And we didn’t have the dairy population in the Tulare and Kings Basin at that point.”

In an all-out effort, the operators must think long term and what their dairies will look like after the flooding recedes. Abernathy recommends that producers keep track of receipts and document their losses. With Governor Newsome, Secretary Vilsack and President Biden declaring an emergency in the majority of California’s counties, Abernathy says this starts the process to start assessing the scope and brevity.

The No. 1 thing that Abernathy says needs to happen in central California is the water must recede.

“Secondly, we need to shore up the breaches and so forth, and we need to protect our cows and we need to protect people,” he says.

To listen to the AgriTalk segment with Abernathy in its entirety, click on:

https://omny.fm/shows/agritalk/agritalk-3-23-23-kevin-abernathy

For more California flooding stories:

California Storms Both a Blessing and a Curse

Mon, 27 Mar 2023 14:04:17 GMT

Mother Nature continues to come down hard on California, proving that too much of a good thing can be too much. The state continues to be bombarded by what meteorologists call atmospheric rivers—narrow bands of precipitation that dump heavy rainfall in a concentrated area. These downpours have wreaked havoc on the state, including the dairy industry, by causing flooding, loss of life, and power outages. At the same time, the precipitation has added to the snowpack, recharged reservoirs, and mitigated drought conditions throughout the state. Yet water scarcity concerns remain.

Snowpack, an essential source of water in spring, is now greater than 200 inches in some mountain locations, said Betty Berning, analyst with the Daily Dairy Report. That’s the good news. As for the bad news, 40 of California’s 58 counties were under a state of emergency, including the key dairy counties of Tulare, Fresno, Kings, Madera, Mariposa, and Merced.

“Localized flooding has caused transportation delays and downtime at dairy manufacturers,” Berning noted. “Water-covered roadways, including major thoroughfares and alternative routes, have made milk deliveries tricky or even impossible in some locations. Spot loads have sold for less than class prices as temporarily closed plants and cooperatives have tried to find a way to use the milk.”

USDA’s Dairy Market News reported that milk production remaied stable through the recent torrential rains and was still tracking above February 2023 levels. That said, California output has not been as strong as originally expected, Berning said, and the situation in California continues to worsen. Some dairy producers have had to move cows out of flooded corrals and barns, while others have had to completely evacuate their herds.

“This will all lead to steep cull rates and increased cases of mastitis and higher somatic cell counts that could further increase culling as drug costs escalate and producers opt not to treat the sickest cows,” Berning said. “Damage to local feed supplies and a drop in breeding and other farm management practices will also reduce conception rates, and eventually the number of heifers available to enter the herd.”

Some operations could remain empty permanently, she said. It appears that the issues wrought by the storm could speed up the slow decline in the state’s dairy industry, she added.

“On a positive note, though, because the Golden State has been in drought for most of the last 15 years, the much-needed excess moisture will help to reverse some of the drought’s impacts. While water restrictions for residents, farmers, and livestock producers are part of life in California, these could also be lessened with the increased moisture.”

According to the National Integrated Drought Information System, in late February, drought covered nearly 85% of California, while today the area affected by drought has dropped to just over 36%, and the most of Central Valley is no longer designated as either abnormally dry or in drought.

However, California’s water issues are far from over, Berning said. Water levels in Lake Mead are still dangerously low even though they have increased from a low of 1040.71 feet on July 27 to 1045.92 by March 23. Federal officials have warned that water in Lake Mead could fall to dead pool levels of 895 feet by 2025, which means water would no longer flow from the lake. At 950 feet, the Hoover Dam would no longer provide hydroelectricity to Arizona, California, and Nevada.

In January, the seven states governed by the Colorado River Compact failed to reach a voluntary agreement on how to cut water use by 2-million to 4-million acre-feet this year as ordered by the Bureau of Reclamation. This means the government could enforce its own plan to prevent water levels in major reservoirs from declining to the point they no longer can supply water or electricity to those who depend on it.

California Flooding Forces Dairies to Move to Higher Ground

Thu, 23 Mar 2023 21:22:36 GMT

$336 million – That’s the preliminary estimate of January ag losses to one California county following a series of atmospheric river storms. Those storms have caused damage to agriculture in Tulare, Monterey and Humboldt counties. The executive director of the Monterey County Farm Bureau says this month’s damages from more storms just in his county could top that January number.

And the waters keep rising, forcing some dairy farmers in Tulare County California to move their operations to higher ground. AgDay affiliate KMPH-TV talked to farmers in the area . They report that six days ago, a levee broke on the Tule River five miles upstream from Nick Koot’s dairy farm in Tulare. He thought it was too far away to impact his dairy.

“Come Thursday, this whole place was under water,” Koot says. “I was worried the cows were going to drown, so we made the decision to get a bunch of trucks from friends and family and we were able to haul the cows off.”

Koot’s says it took two days to move 1,200 cows to his father-in-law’s, his cousin’s and another place that takes farm animals.

Flooding at the Medonza Dairy in Tulare forced them to evacuate the herd.

“We had to evacuate about 1,000 head that were on the lower part of the dairy,” says Alvin Medonza, owner of Medonza Dairy. “We did that by having a bunch of trailers come in and we took them to our neighbors who were up on higher ground.”

Dairymen grow various crops to feed their cows, and right now these two dairy farmers say the situation doesn’t look good.

“Our crops of wheat right now – some of them might survive. The ones that took the blunt of the water where it was basically a river running right through it [won’t likely make it],” Medonza says.

Koot agrees, adding, “If these fields don’t yield of if they all die, I’m going to have trouble feeding my cows in the future. So, I don’t know if I’m going to restart [my farm] up or call it quits and cut my losses.”

The Tulare County Farm Bureau is currently connecting the ag community with information and resources.

“Many dairies have had their feed damaged, so there is a variety of challenges with replacing silage and getting alfalfa onto the replacement locations,” says Tricia Stever-Blattler, Executive Director for Tulare County Farm Bureau.

Moving cows to higher ground has been priority number one for Koot and Medonza. They say when the storms pass, they’ll size up their losses and see how they overcome the flood of 2023.

KMPH-TV “Dairy farmers in Tulare County move herds to higher ground to escape flooding”

California Dairy Industry Hasn’t Escaped Damage from Storms

Wed, 18 Jan 2023 18:57:04 GMT

The nine consecutive storms, or atmospheric rivers, that have battered California, spurred by what meteorologists call a bomb cyclone, have not left California’s dairy industry unscathed. As of last week, neither milk production nor milk deliveries had been disrupted, but another storm and runoff from the Sierra Nevada mountains could change that.

Monica Ganley, analyst with the Daily Dairy Report and principal of Quarterra, an agricultural consulting firm in Buenos Aries, said that last week’s storms left “fields and barns in parts of California under water and many operations without power. In some cases, farm buildings were damaged by severe winds and falling trees. Flooding also caused some dairy manufacturing facilities to take unscheduled downtime.”

At least 19 people have died, while others have been evacuated from the San Joaquin Valley—a major dairy shed. Others in the Valley remain under an evacuation watch, and some highways and roads have been closed. Last week, President Joe Biden declared a state of emergency for California.

“Some areas of the state have already received as much rainfall as they do in a year, and the weather crisis has put California in the unusual position of simultaneously being under a state of emergency for both drought and flooding,” Ganley said.

While California’s storms should subside soon, extreme weather conditions will continue to impact milk production around the world, she noted. Hot, dry conditions undermined milk production in the United States, Europe, and South America in 2022, while wet conditions reduced output in New Zealand and Australia. Last year will likely be the sixth hottest year on record, at least, and warming temperatures show little sign of abating. The Met Office of the United Kingdom predicted that 2023 will be even warmer than last year.

While La Niña was responsible for many of last year’s challenging weather, the weather phenomenon is expected to dissipate sometime in the first quarter of 2023, Ganley noted. The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration forecasts that an El Niño will develop by the fourth quarter of this year, likely bringing warm, dry weather to the Pacific Northwest and Upper Midwest, wet conditions in the southern United States and for South American exporters, and drought in Australia.

“While it is impossible to predict the specific impacts of the El Niño weather phenomenon, clearly dairy producers must be prepared to deal with increasingly intense weather challenges in the future,” she warned.

Major Flooding: Bomb Cyclone Storm Causing Havoc to California Dairy Farmers

Fri, 06 Jan 2023 17:02:55 GMT

While normally any moisture to the Golden State would be welcomed with open arms by farmers, the massive “Bomb Cyclone” storm hitting California is far from normal. A “Bomb Cyclone,” by definition, is a low-pressure system that experiences a fall in pressure of 24 millibars in 24 hours.

High winds, heavy rain and snow, and power outages have impacted California this week. Dairy farmer Hank Van Exel shares that he has received more than 10 inches in the past week. And, it is still raining at his farm in Lodi, located 40 miles south of Sacramento.

“It has been pouring for the last couple of hours,” he stated yesterday afternoon. “I’m sure we’ll have another inch and a half today.”

Van Exel says massive flooding is occurring around his farm, as well as in areas north.

“I have about 500 acres under water,” he shares. “Most of which we have drained out, but it is all filling up again. It remains to be seen how much feed I will lose but it doesn’t look good.”

In addition to the rain, 49- to 60-mph winds have hit Lodi, causing Van Excel to re-bed freestalls over and over.

“We use rice hulls for the calves and the area to the north where we get that from is flooded,” he says.

Van Exel counts himself fortunate, as so far, his farm has not lost power. Neighboring farms have not fared so well, many of which have been out of power for 24 hours.

“A lot of dairyman have flooded corals and have had to move [cows] out,” he says.

Gov. Gavin Newsom signed a statewide emergency declaration earlier this week to help agencies send aid and resources where needed.

Dams Needed

Geoff Vanden Heuvel, the director of regulatory and economic affairs with the California Milk Producer Council, shared on a 2022 National Milk Producers Federation (NMPF) podcast that the California water issue is complex and long-standing. The state was developed without any regulations on groundwater. He also states that between 85% to 90% of California’s milk supply hails from the Central Valley.

“It’s a vast groundwater basin, millions and millions of acre feet of water reside under the ground, and it was never regulated,” he shares. “Dairyman found large tracks of ground that were available and as long as there was water underneath you, you could put wells in and construct the dairy and began to milk cows and grow feed around the dairy and all was well. California always depended on the Central Valley, a combination of groundwater and surface water.”

Vanden Heuvel says that surface water mainly comes from the rain and snow that occurs in the Sierra Nevada mountains, which is directly to the east of the Central Valley.

“For many years, it was a combination of surface water and groundwater that sustained agriculture in California and created really what is an agriculture marvel in the world. I mean, we grow about 250 different agricultural crops and became home to the nation’s largest dairy industry. Water, it was there, there was a lot of it and there wasn’t a huge barrier to accessing it. So, it wasn’t something we spent a lot of time thinking about,” he says.

Van Exel says that the main cause is that the state of California has not built any dams.

“Especially on the Cosumnes River,” he says. “It runs wild. This dam was voted on years ago, but never built.”

Van Exel says he bets 75% of the extra precipitation that comes out of the “Bomb Cyclone” will go to the ocean.

“The worst is the wind,” he says. “The power companies are having a terrible time trying to restore power and so many of the areas can’t even try to get their pumps going. So, I guess this extra rain is not necessarily a good thing.”

California dairy producer Steve Maddox, located 160 miles southeast of Van Exel, says he has received 3 inches of rain in the past two weeks.

“That’s nearly the same amount we received all season long a few years ago,” Maddox says.

Maddox owns and operates Maddox Dairy, home to 4,000 cows and equal number of replacement heifers, and farms 1,600 acres of almonds and 3,000 acres of wine grapes, as well as cropland to supply feed for their cattle. In 2021, Maddox made the hard decision to fallow a third of his 1,800 acres of corn silage cropland due to water restrictions. He says undoubtedly more dams are needed on the reservoirs.

“Our state needs to be able to store more water. From here on out, just give me snow,” he says.

Dairy Report: Hundreds of Dairy Cattle Perish Due to Floods, Farmers Still Recovering

Tue, 07 Dec 2021 19:18:47 GMT

We’re learning more about the damage done to several dairies in Washington State as the result of flooding at the end of last month. The Seattle Times reporting 100 dairy farms in two counties were impacted by the near record flooding. Many of the farms located near the Skagit and Nooksack Rivers.

You are seeing video of the damage to Sumas, which is just south of the U.S. Canadian border. It’s reported one dairy farm, Bumgardner Dairy near Mt. Vernon, lost 44 cows in the flood waters.

A Go-Fund-Me page says the family struggled in frigid, chest deep water for hours trying to save as many as they could but watched cow after cow succumb to the cold and collapse in the swift current.

Also impacted, EPL Feed in Sumas, the largest feed mill in the region. It supplies feed to about 100,000 milking cows in the area. It was offline until just a few days ago. Washington State is the 10th largest milk producing state in the nation.

The situation is not that much better as you go north into Canada and British Columbia. People in Abbotsford are just starting to clean up after an evacuation order was lifted over the weekend. The province’s agriculture minister reporting 420 dairy cattle died in the flooding along with 628,000 poultry and 12,000 hogs.

Richard Bosma was just one of the many farmers in the area who was forced to leave but worked with friends and neighbors to help rescue his animals. The good news, 98% of the cows in the Sumas Prairie region survived the flood waters.

Flood Update from Canada: “When We Got to the Calves, They Were Up to Their Chins in Water”

Sat, 20 Nov 2021 14:46:02 GMT

Canadian dairy farmers have recently been hit hard due to torrential rains that pummeled parts of western Canada’s British Columbia. Some areas of the province received a month’s worth of rain in two days, causing severe flooding and mudslides. These extreme events have forced thousands of people, including numerous dairy farmers along with their animals, to evacuate.

Richard Bosma, a dairy farmer in Abbotsford, British Columbia, is just one of the many farmers in the area who was forced to get out.

“The police knocked down our door at 6 a.m. on Tuesday telling us to evacuate, and we said we couldn’t because we have cows. So, we watched the water get closer and closer. It stayed kind of at the same level for a long time and it stabilized for a bit, but then it came across the road, which is the high point, and it kept coming and was speeding up,” Bosma says.

With the water rising and barns quickly beginning to flood, Bosma was thankful he was able to rely on his friends and neighbors to help rescue his animals.

“People came with cattle trailers, and we were able to get the milk cows out first. When we got to the calves (in the calf barn), they were up to their chins in water. We left the young animals [heifers] on wet packs and planned to get them out the next day,” he noted.

However, flood levels were continuing to rise, and the Barrowtown Pump Station used to divert water into the Sumas River was being overwhelmed by the floodwaters.

“Around 7 p.m. that night, they informed us the big pumps were about to fail because they were going to be underwater. They had a huge crew of 200 people who were sandbagging, and they managed to keep the pump safe and running,” Bosma says. “We were able to go back in and get to our young animals that next morning, but we couldn’t get to them with pickup trucks anymore. When we left, the water was about 2’ to 2.5’ deep, but it was around (4 to 4.5) when we returned.”

The family had to act quickly. The decision was made to hook the cattle trailer up to a tractor to get the animals to safer ground. One by one, animals were loaded onto trailers and transported to neighboring farms. Currently, Bosma’s 80 cows and additional calves and heifers are being housed at six to seven different farms throughout the province.

With the animals now taken care of, Bosma and his wife were able to evacuate their farmhouse and stay safe with family on dry ground. However, despite relatively nice weather over the last few days, flood levels have not improved. In the coming weeks and months, Bosma, along with hundreds of other farmers throughout the area, will have a long road to recovery ahead of them.

“In the barn, we’ve got pumps and (tractor) motors underwater, and those are going to take a lot of work to get running again. Our barn office computers are shot. I found our semen tank floating on its side, and that had a few embryos and expensive semen inside. And who knows how much mold and damage is going to come from all of this. Everything is going to take a lot of work, but we’re going to take everything one day at a time” he exclaims.

According to The Guardian, Abbotsford, one of the areas hit hardest by the phenomenon, is one of Canada’s most intensively and diversely farmed areas. Home to more than 1,200 farms, it supplies half of the dairy, eggs and poultry consumed by British Columbia’s 5.2 million residents.

Thousands of dairy cattle in the area have been transported to various farms throughout the country, but unfortunately, not all have survived.

“There are probably hundreds of farms that have been affected by flooding. Some are still underwater, some are on dry locations and we have thousands of animals that have perished. We have many, many more that are in difficult situations,” Lana Popham, minister of agriculture for British Columbia, told The Guardian.

As farmers continue to try and find ways to care for their animals, Bosma notes the (BC Dairy Producers Association) is working to provide assistance.

“Our association has been phoning every day to see what they can do to help. They have a little more influence on the local government than we do, and they’ve been able to issue some permits to people that allows them to get into areas where we otherwise wouldn’t be able to go and let them tap into some emergency fuel. They’ve been working pretty hard to help us out and help keep track of where our animals are located,” Bosma says.

While water levels in some parts has declined, mudslides in the area have destroyed roads and bridges, severing access to the country’s largest port in Vancouver. This is on top of an already disrupted supply chain. Dairy farmers remaining in the flood-affected area are being asked to dump milk due to impossible transport.

Over the course of a week, the community has been forced to rally together to overcome this natural disaster.

Holger Schwichtenberg, chair of the board for the B.C. Dairy Association, told The Canadian Press, “This is an example of an industry coming together when things really get ugly. We’re doing the best that we can with the situation that we’ve been handed and it’s a tough one.’'

Canadian Dairy Farmers Hit Hard by Devastating ‘Atmospheric River’ Floods

Thu, 18 Nov 2021 15:02:57 GMT

Canadian dairy farmers have recently been hit hard by two days of torrential rains spanning across the Pacific Northwest portion of the U.S. and into British Columbia. Some areas of the province received 8 inches of rain on Sunday, the amount that usually falls over the course of a month. The phenomenon is known as an ‘atmospheric river.’

Abbotsford, B.C., is one of the areas hit the hardest. Dairy farmers in the area were told to evacuate on Tuesday as floodwaters washed over one of British Columbia’s prime agriculture areas. According to The Canadian Press, the flooding situation has forced farmers to lean on each other to save their animals.

“When I see calves that are underwater that they rescued and threw in the boat to save them, on one hand it breaks my heart, but on the other hand, I’m just so impressed with our community, our farming community, and how they come together and help each other. And that’s what they’re doing,” Henry Braun, Mayor of Abbotsford, told CTV News.

According to CTV News, volunteers used boats and personal watercraft to rescue animals and haul them to transport vehicles.

“This is an example of an industry coming together when things really get ugly,” said Holger Schwichtenber, a Canadian dairy farmer and board member of the BC Dairy Association. “We’re doing the best that we can with the situation that we’ve been handed and it’s a tough one.”

Schwichtenber is expected to take 25 to 30 cows from farmer impacted by the flooding and transport them to his own farm in Agassiz.

“You’ve got trucks, you’ve got neighbors, you’ve got whoever’s got a pickup truck or something to haul cattle in and you start moving them to higher ground or you’ve made arrangements to get them off-site,” Schwichtenber told The Canadian Press.

Mudslides in the area have destroyed roads and bridges, severing access to the country’s largest port in Vancouver. This is on top of an already disrupted supply chain. Dairy farmers in the flood-affected area are being asked to dump milk due to impossible transport, according to The Canadian Press. The B.C. Milk Marketing Board is advising its producers in the areas of Abbotsford, Chilliwack and the B.C. Interior to dispose of their milk by dumping it into manure piles.

The floods have temporarily shut down much of the movement of wheat and canola from Canada, one of the world’s biggest grain exporters, Reuters reports. The disruption could also hit exports of potash.

West Versus East: A Tale of Two Weather Stories

Wed, 28 Jul 2021 17:36:45 GMT

Mother Nature has been active across the U.S., with a tale of two weather stories unfolding this summer that has greatly impacted dairy farms. Weather effects all areas of a dairy farm—from calves, to cows calving, to milk cows and crops.

The rising thermometer out west has made the work to ensure cows are cool and comfortable much harder. In eastern Washington, Jason Sheehan, a fourth-generation dairy farmer who runs J & K Dairy located 45 minutes outside of the Tri-Cities, faced 115 degrees last month, plus a week where temperatures were over 100 degrees for a week straight. Sheehan milks 3,000 cows and farms 1,400 acres of cropland, with all the feed raised going back to feed his herd. “The heat wasn’t as brutal for us compared to those on the western side of the state,” he said.

The eastern side of the Evergreen state normally gets warm weather. However, the heat coming early in the summer, coupled with the extent of the extreme heat made the intensity sizzle, especially for dairy farmers. “It only cooled off to 80 at night,” Sheehan adds. “It was almost like California or Arizona weather.”

Half of J & K Dairy’s cows are housed in an open lot and the other half in freestalls. They are equipped with fans and soakers in the holding pen, over the cows, plus shades. Sheehan says the freestalls allow for the cows to stay cooler compared to the open lots, where the cows would group under the shade and didn’t travel to the bunk to eat, as it is located outside in the full sun.

According to Sheehan his milk co-op was down 20% on milk production due to the hot stretch in June. J & K Dairy saw a decline in milk production at their dairy but believes the heat abatement – with shades and soakers – allowed their cows to nearly get back to previous production levels.

When it comes to newborn calves, getting their start in the extreme heat is “tough” according to Sheehan.

Two years ago, after dealing with summer heat, Sheehan saw the need to install shade cloth over the fresh cow pen. “Our next project will be to install shade cloth over all the feed areas,” Sheehan notes. “This will hopefully drive more cows to the bunk when hot weather strikes.”

When Sheehan looks out at his crops, he says they are looking tough and inconsistent. “We are fortunate, as we don’t have issues with any irrigation and luckily have cooled off to 88 degrees,” he notes.

Taking care of employees is essential, especially as they work during the heat. “Our employees who handle irrigation and have to work out in the heat start early and finish early as well as take plenty of water breaks to ensure they are also staying cool and comfortable.”

A Different Weather Story Unfolds in the Northeast

If only there was a way one could take some of the hot weather and send it east, as a different story unfolds in Schodack Landing, N.Y.

More than twelve inches of rain has fallen since July 1 near Albany, N.Y., where Dutch Hollow Farms resides. Owned and operated by the Chittenden family, with the partnership of brothers, Brian, Alan and Nathan, as well as their parents, Paul and Melanie. Dutch Hollow milks 800 Registered Jerseys and farms 1,800 acres of corn, alfalfa and grass hay.

Spring fieldwork began on time for the Chittenden family with slightly dry field conditions. They began planting at the end of April and they report the first two weeks of May were wet and early corn ground became crusted over. Unfortunately, they had to replant three-fourths of it, but according to Brian Chittenden, their crops looked awesome at the end of June.

With historical flooding and rain events that brought 2 to 4 inches of rain per hour, the Chittenden’s have only had three days without measurable rain since July 1. While Dutch Hollow’s fields are saturated, with a dozen inches of rain tallied so far this month, they feel fortunate. To the south of them, 20 inches of rain has been recorded and to the north, 14 inches. “We were fortunate to get second cutting silage in the end of June,” Chittenden says. “Others weren’t so lucky.”

Still, the Chittenden’s have not turned a wheel since. Corn side-dressing, fungicide and post fieldwork has not been done either. “Alfalfa, corn and beans have all gone backward and stood still,” he notes. “Anything that went in late is in trouble and insurance claims are going in.”

One of Chittenden’s neighbors states he has lost 75% of his soybeans, as they have just plain drowned out and most have made little to no dry hay yet this year. “It will take a week of good weather before we would even consider trying to get out there,” Chittenden adds.

Thankfully back at the dairy, milk production has held steady. The worries for Chittenden’s shift back to their crops, knowing they are behind. “We had a week in June with lows near 40°F and highs barely made it to 50,” Brian says. “So early corn, on well drained fields, still looks good. However, anything that was planted late is bad.”

Mother Nature’s extreme weather continues to play out throughout the U.S. Out east, time is needed to dry fields out and the Chittenden’s are aware that harvest is likely to be late this year. Out west, time is also needed as Sheehan’s cows recover from the extreme heat.

Congress Introduces Bill to Address Feed Shortages After Disasters

Fri, 20 Nov 2020 05:48:07 GMT

A bipartisan bill has been introduced in Congress that aims to help farmers and ranchers in handling feed and forage shortages following recent natural disasters. The Feed Emergency Enhancement During Disasters Act (FEEDD Act) was put forward by U.S. Representatives Dusty Johnson (R-SD) and Angie Craig (D-MN) on June 10. The legislation provides greater flexibility to farmers and ranchers during this planting season when high levels of prevent plant are happening because of extreme moisture or drought.

The FEEDD Act would allow producers who utilize prevent plant to at least plant and graze, hay or chop a cover crop before November 1st in the event of a feed shortage due to excessive moisture, flood or drought. Through the waiver, these producers would not have to take a further discount under the Federal Crop Insurance Program.

“Producers are already facing five years of declining net farm incomes and this wet spring has thrown another challenge their way,” says Rep. Johnson. “South Dakota farmers are resilient, but they’ve made it clear – a common-sense solution is needed to alleviate the feed shortage across the country. The FEEDD Act will allow Secretary Perdue to move up the November 1st harvest date on producers prevent plant acres. This simple fix will help ease our feed shortage, enhance the farm safety net, and improve soil health by promoting cover crops. Government can’t control the weather, but we must do what we can to provide certainty to our farmers and ranchers. I will continue to work with the Department on an Administrative fix, but Congress should do what we can to fix this long-term.”

“In the midst of a delayed planting season, falling commodity prices, and limited market access, Congress has a responsibility to provide farmers and ranchers the flexibility they need to do their jobs successfully. This bill takes a critical step toward giving the Secretary explicit authority to waive the November 1st harvest date for cover crops on prevent plant ground,” says Rep. Craig. “While my colleagues and I will continue to work with the USDA to find Administrative ways to address this issue, Congress must take action on this long-standing concern with a long-term solution and pursue all possible avenues for relief. Additionally, by incentivizing the planting of cover crops, we’re building resiliency and feed stability for farmers throughout my district. I’m proud to lead this common-sense, broadly supported, and bipartisan effort.”

The FEEDD Act, also known as H.R.3183 , is co-sponsored by 11 other Representatives, including House Agriculture Committee Chairman Collin Peterson (D-MN).

The legislation has the backing of a number of associations and businesses. Here is what some of those groups are saying:

“As farmers and ranchers across the country struggle through a difficult planting season, I am glad to see this common-sense approach to helping livestock producers and farmers alike through allowing the planting of crops for forage after the prevent plant date. This year so far has been unprecedented for American farmers, and this pragmatic approach allows farmers flexibility in the management of their land, while allowing for livestock forage to be grown,” says Zippy Duvall, President, American Farm Bureau Federation.

“Unusually wet weather and widespread flooding have made this spring incredibly challenging for family farmers in ranchers. In many areas, it has been too wet to put seeds in the ground, which has forced many farmers to rely on prevented planting insurance coverage to make ends meet. While prevented planting offers a critical risk management tool, the November 1st harvest date prevents many farmers from utilizing a “second crop” as forage. We applaud Representative Angie Craig and Representative Dusty Johnson for introducing the FEEDD Act, which will provide family farmers and ranchers with important flexibility during yet another tough year for American agriculture,” says Roger Johnson, president of the National Farmers Union.

“With producers in South Dakota and across the country struggling to deal with the aftermath of natural disasters, the introduction of the FEEDD Act comes at a critical time. Early access to cover crops will help producers manage the worst impacts from this year’s planting season. NBCA appreciates the efforts of U.S. Representative Johnson and the other co-sponsors to provide agricultural producers with much-needed relief,” says Todd Wilkinson, National Cattlemen’s Beef Association policy division vice chairman from De Smet, South Dakota.

“Mother Nature dealt producers a tough hand this year, but Congress is taking steps to help. The legislation introduced by U.S. Representative Craig and the other co-sponsors will ensure that producers can use their cover crops in a timely fashion. This support is critical for hardworking farmers and ranchers trying to recover,” says Don Schiefelbein, National Cattlemen’s Beef Association policy division chairman from Kimball, Minnesota.

“We commend Reps. Johnson and Craig for introducing the bipartisan Feed Emergency Enhancement During Disasters Act. This legislation is a helpful response to the feed shortage that dairy farmers have faced this spring due to intense floods. We urge Congress to pass this legislation without delay so that farmers and ranchers have the flexibility they need to navigate current conditions,” says Jim Mulhern, president and CEO of National Milk Producers Federation.

“Planting cover crops in a normal year is just the smart thing to do, as it not only helps protect soil from water and wind erosion, but can capture and produce needed nutrients for the following year’s crops. Due to this unusually rainy spring, we are facing the potential for a large number of fields to not be planted, and therefore, it is even more important that producers protect their soil with cover crops over the next year. By providing flexibility for when a producer can utilize cover crop plantings, the Feed Emergency Enhancement During Disasters Act will encourage the adoption of this important conservation practice while adding forage options as an additional economic incentive,” says Tim Palmer, president of National Association of Conservation Districts from Truro, Iowa.

“After the spring season we’ve just experienced, this legislation is welcome to allow farmers the chance to make the most of what they can of this growing season. Feed inventories were greatly diminished with the excessive flooding earlier this spring. Whatever inventories dairy and beef farmers had built up over the past few years became pretty valuable after the weather we had late last year. The slow and incredibly wet start to this planting and growing season didn’t help matters either,” says John Rettler, dairy farmer from Neosho, Wisconsin, and president of FarmFirst Dairy Cooperative .

“I want to thank Representatives Johnson and Craig for their leadership on this issue. Our cooperative represents dairy farms throughout the Upper Midwest, and many of them are struggling to get a crop in and are concerned about what the feed outlook is for the coming year. The FEEDD Act will give dairy farmers and other livestock producers much needed flexibility as we work through the challenges caused by an unusually wet spring,” says Mitch Davis, treasurer of Edge Dairy Farmer Cooperative and general manager of Davis Family Dairies in south-central Minnesota .

PETA Tries Capitalizing on Cattle Flooding Deaths with Billboards

Fri, 20 Nov 2020 05:24:31 GMT

After more than a month since widespread flooding and blizzards devastated cattle producers in Nebraska and surrounding states, an animal rights group is using the tragedy to push a vegan diet.

Animal rights group People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals (PETA) announced on April 1 plans to build billboards in cities near where flooding was prevalent this spring. The press releases included an inaccurate death toll count from the storms saying “approximately 1 million calves were killed in the flooding across the Midwest—many of whose dead bodies washed up along the riverbanks.”

The planned billboards include a Holstein dairy cow wearing an activity monitoring collar that appears to be swimming in a pond. The wording on the PETA billboard says “Stop Eating Meat! They Die for Your Cruel and Dirty Habit.” Cities included Kansas City, Mo. ; St. Louis, Mo. ; Fargo, N.D. and Sioux Falls, S.D.

“Every hamburger or steak dinner supports an industry that has repeatedly allowed scores of sensitive animals to suffer and die in natural disasters,” says PETA Executive Vice President Tracy Reiman. “PETA’s billboard will challenge passersby to take personal responsibility for the painful deaths of these gentle calves by keeping cows and all other animals off their plates.”

The first billboard arrived in Kansas City around mid-April and have come under scrutiny from social media users and the Missouri Cattlemen’s Association. In a response to a news story by Kansas City television station FOX4, Mike Deering, the organizations executive vice president, shares that farmers and ranchers are at the mercy of the weather and these floods were devastating.

“Farm and ranch families love their animals. It’s their life. When disaster strikes, they put it all on the line to save their livestock,” Deering says. “Neighbors help neighbors. We stand tall and have zero tolerance for the hate and ignorance of PETA.”

People that FOX4 interviewed even said that the advertisement is deceptive.

“It’s out of context,” says Emily Reinhardt, who tells the TV station she rarely eats meat. “A flood happened and [it had nothing to do with] eating meat or the farmers treating cattle [poorly].”

Here is a sampling of the social media posts that have followed after the billboard became news and some of the comments point out the obliviousness of the animal rights group, while others say they aren’t going to give up eating beef:

PETA doing what PETA does best, capitalizing on a natural disaster to push their “political agenda.”

PETA’s new Billboard along Hwy 71 and 63rd St in Kansas City. pic.twitter.com/tadXXKhd1l
— Sunshine☀️ (@Farmlvngirl) April 25, 2019

PETA's new billboard alludes to the cows that drowned in recent flooding. This one is near 63rd and Prospect. pic.twitter.com/gh6Pb3jZTf
— Chris Morrison (@KCChrisM) April 24, 2019

This isn’t the first time that PETA has used tragedy to help push a vegan agenda. A crash in November 2017 involving beef cattle prompted a similar misuse of a dairy calf in a PETA billboard. After a semi-trailer hauling hogs in Minnesota rolled over in July last year the animal rights group planned a similar billboard . A March train collision with a semi-trailer in California also prompted PETA to put up a billboard telling people to go vegan.

For more on PETA’s billboard tactics during the past few years read the following stories: