Wednesday, July 25, 2012

Crops get much-needed drink, more rains needed soon

Rainfall across the northern U.S. Midwest over the next 10 days will provide some relief for the drought-stricken corn and soybean crops, but more rain is needed to stem further crop losses, agricultural meteorologists said on Tuesday.
Rains from central Minnesota eastward to the northern regions of Illinois, Indiana and Ohio since late Monday through midday Tuesday averaged 0.75 inch to 1.25 inch, said Joel Widenor, an agricultural forecaster with Commodity Weather Group. Heavier amounts of up to 2.0 inches fell in central and southeastern Minnesota.
The midday U.S. weather outlook turned a little drier for this week, with 60 to 65 percent of the Midwest expected to get rain versus 80 percent in an earlier run, Widenor said. The six to 10-day model run was the same, continuing to show "extensive" rains for the Midwest, but the 11-15 day outlook was drier for the central and northeastern Midwest.
"We will still pull some thunder showers out of the Central Plains on Thursday and bring them through northern Missouri out towards central Illinois, Indiana and Ohio by late Thursday into Friday," said Widenor, noting that more rain is needed to eliminate Midwest dryness.

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