Everyday you listen to the weather forecast. Your family wants to know how to dress appropriately. You want to know how your revenue stream will be impacted. Knowing what the weather will be can make a considerable difference in your management of risk and the way you operate your farm. Most of the Cornbelt had a challenging year, so let’s take a look at what to expect turning into 2008.

Late last month Brad Rippey briefed the US House Agriculture Committee. Rippey is a meteorologist for USDA’s World Agricultural Outlook Board which estimates world supply and demand statistics as outlined in Monday’s posting on the farm gate. Noting that it had been 20 years since the 1988 drought that stretched coast to coast, Rippey said there had been many regional droughts that have impacted crop production.

At the outset of 2007, the drought in the Central US was suddenly washed away with flooding, which hurt the winter wheat. And in the Southeast the record warmth in March helped plant the crop early, only to be hit by record cold in April that hurt wheat, corn, fruit, specialty, and nursery crops. Freeze damage extended throughout the Ohio Valley westward into the Great Plains. Rippey said the April freeze will be the first such freeze outside of the nation’s citrus belt to reach the billion dollar damage benchmark. Coming out of the freeze, the drought in the Southeast intensified.

Rippey said, “The US corn crop for the most part experienced good weather during the 2007 growing season.” Adding that yields will be a record high for corn, he noted soybean yields will be lower than 2006, but said the smaller crop is not totally blamed on the weather. “While the eradication of drought in the Central and Southern Plains resulted in generally improved wheat yields, rains were excessive in some areas.”

For the winter and spring, Rippey told Congress that drought conditions have lingered across the Southeast and much of the west, causing concerns about water supplies approaching the 2008 cropping season. As an example, Rippey said the reservoirs in California are only at two-thirds of typical storage capacity.

The recent development of a La Nina has a significant implication for US weather according to Rippey. A La Nina is a cooling of the Equatorial surface waters in the Pacific, which disrupts the Jet Stream across the southern states, resulting in drier than normal weather from autumn into spring. He says with the existing drought, the lack of moisture could be serious for winter wheat in the Southeast. But he said extending the drought, which began in 2006 in the Southeast all the way into 2008, would lead to summer crops being planted in dust. While the Southeast’s contribution to wheat is minimal, is produces 25% of the cotton and 66% of the peanuts.

Rippey said soil moisture is favorable in the Southern Plains and the winter wheat should be well established. But the National Weather Service has issued a drought warning for western Oklahoma through January. Another La Nina impact will be warmer and wetter weather in the Ohio Valley and the Northwest. He’s expecting a lack of persistent frigid weather which will ease the stress on livestock and result in some disease and pest issues in 2008. But the accompanying moisture in the Ohio value would help small grains and ease drought conditions. Rippey said the impact of La Nina will diminish in the spring months, and the latest March to May outlook calls for the wet conditions to subside in the Ohio valley.

Summary:
The April freeze earlier this year may have caused as much as $1 billion damage; but it came in the middle of a drought in the Southeastern US which continues to persist, and without some winter moisture relief, the Southeastern wheat, cotton, and peanut crops could be in jeopardy. A La Nina will keep the Ohio Valley warmer and wetter than usual this winter, but it should diminish during the spring months.