Friday evening, July 17, 2015

This evening, I was able to go back to the Waldo farm to do a little replanting.  It turned out to be 4 acres.  Doesn’t sound like much, but every little bit helps.  It planted very nice, and I thought as I was planting, “I wish this were April 17th, it would feel better doing this today.”   The soybean planter is parked again.  If I can do no more replanting by Monday, we’ll clean it up and put it away. The elevated temperatures of the past 2-3 days have dried the soil adequately, at least at this location.   We’ll check Huey tomorrow.  There was rain water still standing there 2 days ago…

You can see in this ‘look ahead’ picture where the soybeans drowned in this slight depression in the field. These 4 acres were killed by the inability of the water to timely escape after some of the heavy, heavy rain events.

Looking back from the tractor cab, you can see that the soybean planter is placing the seed into the soil in nearly-ideal conditions today. Look! There’s even some dust from the soil surface being kicked up by this planting operation!

Looking at the White River this afternoon, It came up quite a bit over the last 24 hours.  If we read the forecast correctly, it’s near its crest (again) at about 21 feet.  It is predicted to drop rapidly, and be back in its banks by Tuesday evening/Wednesday morning.  I am convinced that those acres flooded today will not be replanted… it’ll simply be too late.

So, we’re grateful for the small window of opportunity for replant 15.

The crops that did not drown in these several weeks of flooding look pretty good.  Just across IN Hwy 550 from today’s replant work, the soybeans at the Roberson Farm are downright beautiful!

The grain markets are reacting to the widespread flood damage across the Midwest.

Have a pleasant weekend.