It’s been a tough year for Wright County and Annandale area farmers. First drought damaged their crops in July, then too much rain in October has delayed the harvest and made it more difficult. And now the soybeans and corn they’re bringing in are, as expected, below average, or worse. "It’s been just a terribly frustrating year for farmers," Kevin Bergquist, director of the federal Farm Service Agency office in Buffalo, said late last week. It’s been too dry and too hot, then too wet, he said. "You name it." Albion Township farmer Doug Triplett added: "It hasn’t been a great year. "Just like everybody else, we went from a drought to a flood all in the same year. "If it would’ve rained in the summer and turned dry now, it would’ve been a perfect year," he said. But "it’s never perfect." And according to Larry Hoffman, who farms south of Annandale: "I would say we’re lucky we’re getting what we’re getting for how dry it was. "It’s turning out pretty decent." But some farmers north of Annandale fared badly, he said, as their crops "got burned good" by the drought. After little rain fell in July, Wright and 23 other Minnesota counties were designated federal agricultural disaster areas due to drought conditions that took their toll on the crops. The rain returned in August and September, and farmers hoped the harvest would go well, Bergquist said. But heavy rains hit the county the first part of October. "As a result we have not seen much harvest activity for the last 10 days, two weeks," he said Thursday, Oct. 25. Farmers were just getting back into their fields to resume the soybean harvest. Normally it would have been finished by mid-October, but he guessed it was only about half done and wouldn’t be complete until early November. Many farmers bought tracks for their combines to avoid getting stuck in muddy fields, Bergquist said. Plugged up equipment Compounding the problem, moisture makes the main soybean plant stringy, and they wrap around and plug up farmers’ equipment. While the average soybean crop amounts to about 45 bushels an acre, many yields are in the 30s and 20s, he said, but the figures are all over the board. Some farmers who couldn’t harvest their soybeans because it was too wet started on their corn instead, Bergquist said. Corn can be harvested in wet conditions because, unlike soybeans, the equipment doesn’t touch the ground. The corn harvest is about half finished, he estimated, but it won’t be over until late this year because farmers will be working on soybeans into November. An average corn crop would produce 150-180 bushels per acre on heavy soil and 120 on light ground, but yields have been in the 80-90 and 30-50 range. Most farmers are looking at harvesting only half a crop of corn compared to what they had hoped for, Bergquist said. Some stalks are rotting, and sprouts have been developing on the ears of some corn plants, he said, in a phenomenon that he hasn’t seen in 25 years. "It’s just very, very rare." Though Bergquist said it’s been "a miserable year" and both crops will be below average, he acknowledged that with better conditions "things can look much different in two weeks as far as getting the crop off." Triplett grows about 730 acres of soybeans and 500 acres of corn south and east of Annandale. He spent a couple of days harvesting soybeans early this month until the rains came and wasn’t able to get back to them until last week. "I started on my lighter soil because I knew I could probably go there without getting stuck," he said. Triplett estimated he had about 400 acres of soybeans to go and that it would take about five days. "We’ve just got to hope it doesn’t rain now so we can get the beans done and start on the corn." He’s done about 150 acres of corn and has another 350 to go. Both crops have been below average because of damage done by the drought, and he expects that will be the case overall. "That’s kind of the nature of the business," he said. "We can’t control the weather and we live with whatever we get." "The prices are a bright spot," Triplett said. "That’s the one good thing." Buoyed by ethanol and world demand, corn prices last week were about $3.30 a bushel compared to $2 two years ago. Soybeans were $8.60 compared to about $5.50. But farmers’ expenses were going up too, he said. Hoffman and his son Wade farm about 1,500 acres of soybeans and 1,600 acres of corn between Annandale and Cokato. They started combining soybeans about Oct. 1, he said, switched to corn during the wet weather and resumed soybeans last week after the rains. Fighting through mud They were "fighting our way through the mud," he said, and hoped to finish the remaining 750 acres in a week. About half the corn, 800 acres, remained, and Hoffman expected to finish up later than mid-November. Soybean yields are about average at around 40 bushels per acre, but corn is expected to be below average at 120 to 130 bushels because of the drought. "It could’ve been worse," Hoffman said. "For this area we’ve done good, but farther north they got burned good," he said referring to areas north of Annandale where the soil is lighter and more porous and crops dried up. Some of those farmers are having their third bad year in a row, Bergquist has said, and are experiencing severe economic hardship. Hoffman said his son, who farms two corn fields just west of South Haven, "found out how bad it was." Farmers are lucky to average 25 or 30 bushels an acre in that area, he said.
