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Agronomist says in year of weather anomalies, a cold May sticks out
An agronomist says for all the weather anomalies of 2020, a cool stretch in May might’ve had the biggest impact on crops in his region.
Ryan Dunsbergen covers southeast Iowa and northeast Missouri for Golden Harvest Seeds. He says 2019 ended with a cold, wet harvest that compacted soils, and was followed by a poor freeze/thaw cycle over the winter.
“I think we had kind of a dead soil, so to speak. Not a lot of happy microbes in the soil. And then we hit that cold May, and I think that further put us behind on getting the crop up and running.”
He tells Brownfield emergence suffered, some nutrients were deficient, and Dunsbergen is concerned about a repeat in 2021.
“Man, we just are not looking at very good freezing conditions for this year, so some of this could trickle into next year.”
But he’s encouraged because farmers had more time this past fall for tillage and fertilizer applications, and Dunsbergen hopes a better freeze/thaw cycle will help alleviate the remaining compaction.
