County, farmers in need of rain

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Drought conditions in South Dakota have worsened since the beginning of July, with the latest U.S. Drought Monitor map shows nearly 11 percent of the state being in extreme drought.

Roughly 31 percent of the state is rated in severe drought, up slightly from a few weeks ago.

Another nearly 31 percent of South Dakota is experiencing moderate drought conditions, an increase from just under 24 percent last week.

Joe Knippling, executive director of the Moody County Farm Services Agency, said so far the corn is hanging on, but it’s starting to get serious.

He also said beans are not in as good of shape in most cases because when planting beans, some areas were either too wet or were affected by hard wind, rain or hail.

“[The beans] didn’t emerge the way they should’ve from the ground or the hail caused some replanting,” Knippling said.

Despite some rain in the northeast part of Moody County early last week, the accompanying wind and hail did not help crops.

Knippling said most areas in the county need rain badly.

“Most of the rain in the county has been spotty,” Knippling said. “Some areas got good rain, some didn’t get any.”

During a storm early last week, the northeast portion of the county got from 1 to 1.5 inches of rain, and the rest of the county got a quarter or tenth of an inch down to zero.

Knippling said the last rain to happen right in Flandreau was probably June 11.

“From the 11th through the 13th or 14th [of June], we had probably two to three inches of rain total,” Knippling said.

(The area did get about .41 inches of rain on July 11.)

That helped the crops get started, but now farmers in the county need more.

Starting this week, he said  corn should begin to tassel, depending on the weather.

The Agriculture Department estimates South Dakota’s winter wheat crop will total 28 million bushels, down 56 percent from last year, and the spring wheat crop at 32 million bushels, down 32 percent.