May 30, 2011

Kansas wheat crop continues to be affected by drought 

Drought conditions continue to affect Kansas wheat crop and more than 50% of the crop is in poor condition.

Rebecca Davis, Kansas regional director of the USDA's Risk Management Agency, said farmers have collected insurance on about 90,000 acres, largely in western Kansas.

Davis said that she toured Lane County fields to assess damage. She said thousands of acres were being released each week for other uses. "It's overwhelming," Davis said.

The Kansas Agricultural Statistic Service said more than half the wheat crop is in poor condition.

About 60% of Kansas is in a moderate to exceptional drought as measured by the US Drought Monitor. The remainder of Kansas is considered abnormally dry.

Drought conditions stretch across much of the High Plains from Texas into southwest Kansas. Joey Kuehler, a crop consultant with Dodge City based Servi-Tech, said many of the counties will not have much of a wheat harvest, unless the land is irrigated.

"I don't think more than 5 or 10% will be taken to harvest," he said. "There is so little dry land wheat that remains."

Rainfall has not been significant in the region for nearly a year. Moisture that does fall quickly evaporates from hot temperatures and high winds near 50 mph.

Kuehler said a few areas might yield 20 bushels of wheat an acre, while irrigated land that normally averages 70 bushels or more will be closer to 40 to 50 bushels an acre. Farmers are comparing conditions to 1956 when farmers in Haskell County harvested nearly no crop at all.