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Meteorologist reflects on an ugly growing season in the Central Plains

An atmospheric scientist says farmers in the Western Corn Belt battled unprecedented weather challenges during the heart of the growing season.

Eric Snodgrass is with Nutrien Ag Solutions. “It was one of the craziest years I’ve seen in awhile in the Central Plains with the massive severe weather event they had early that knocked out all of the pivot irrigation. Then, the drought that they settled into later.  I mean, the number of days above 100 Fahrenheit, it’s been a long time since I’ve seen such a hot summer there.”

He tells Brownfield the region missed out on several opportunities for significant relief. “The problem is that the new set up of the jet stream pattern after it broke away from what made us into that drought, each new system that’s come out of the middle part of the country has missed part of the heart of the hard red winter wheat belt, which hits parts of Nebraska and Kansas.  It’s been wetter to the east of there.”

The latest US Drought Monitor showed all of Nebraska and most of Kansas, South Dakota and Iowa in a classification of drought.

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