Corn farmers across the Hawkeye state are assessing the damage after a storm packing triple digit wind speeds laid waste to this year’s crop.
On Monday, a derecho, or straight line wind storm, leveled what was expected to be a record crop with winds topping 100 miles per hour. Early estimates from state officials show up to ten million acres have been impacted by the rare weather event.
Described as a hurricane without an eye, the storm did most of its damage in Iowa, wiping out millions of acres of corn and soybeans. The neighboring states Nebraska, Illinois, Indiana, Wisconsin, and Michigan also were impacted along the storms 770 mile journey. As of Friday, 25 counties in Iowa have been declared disaster areas by Iowa Governor Kim Reynolds.
Vice President Mike Pence visited Iowa later in the week as cleanup was well underway.
For many farmers, clean up begins with one hand tied behind their backs as trade wars and the global pandemic continue to weigh down rural America.
Dr. Mark Licht, Iowa State University: ”In the near term, we have to decide, do we keep this crop for grain or do we try to get some forage value out of it, either as a green chop, um, feeding it fresh, you know, to livestock, or do we, um, try to incisal it, um, for, for cattle down the road. Um, and that, that decision is going to have to be made relatively quick.”
According to the latest USDA World Agricultural Supply and Demand Estimates report, the 2020 corn crop, if realized, will come in at just over 15 billion bushels. Government officials are still trying to pinpoint exactly what kind of impact this week’s storm might have on final crop numbers.
Dr. Mark Licht, Iowa State University: ”Just starting to think through number of acres of corn, um, that were affected in percent yield loss and trying to average things out, you know, we could be in 150 million or more bushels, you know, total production that, that come up short this year. /That will be a big thing.”
For Market to Market, I’m John Torpy
Producer Contact: torpy@iowapbs.org