Farmer fortunate after reviewing crop damage from weekend tornado

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Farmer fortunate after reviewing crop damage from weekend tornado

Photo by David Wessell

A west central Illinois corn and soybean farmer feels fortunate after assessing damage from a small tornado that passed through their farm over the weekend.

David Wessel who farms near Chandlerville tells Brownfield thankfully everyone is safe and there was no structural damage, but it did destroy a 150-yard stretch of a corn field.

“Where it hit, it’s pretty much 100% losses. It snapped the corn off about a foot above the ground with very few stalks left standing there. But when you look at the grand scheme of things it is less than 5% of our total crop land so we are pretty fortunate.”

He says while he generally welcomes rain in July, it could shut off anytime since they’ve received around 8 inches in the last 10 days.

“It is starting to take a toll on soybeans, I see yellow spots starting to show up. From the spring we had, we have good stands so we were pretty optimistic that we were going to have a good crop and I am still optimistic that it can turn out to be above average for our area.”

Wessel also serves as an at-large director for the Illinois Soybean Association.

Interview with David Wessell

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