A big change in Wisconsin soil moisture conditions
Monday, August 27, 2007, 4:30 PM
by Bob Meyer
The soil moisture profile is the big news in the weekly Crop Progress Report from the Wisconsin Field Office of NASS. Everything is saturated in the three southern districts with 69% surplus in the southwest, 83% surplus in the south central and 98% surplus in the southeast district. The central and west central districts are not far behind. Things did improve in the northern districts with 52% short or very short in the northwest, 50% in the northeast and only 6% short or very short in the north central. In fact, the northwest and north central districts have some in the surplus category. Last week those areas were nearly 100% short to very short. Madison is now 13.92 inches above normal year-to-date rainfall and La Crosse is 8.34 inches over average. Eau Claire is still 4.88 inches below normal as of Sunday.
The Badger State corn crop now as 81% in the dough stage, a 20-point gain from last week and 18 points better than the 5-year average for this date. The crop is 38% dented compared to 18% average. Condition of the crop improved, now 53% good to excellent compared to 45% last week. Those conditions do vary greatly, in some areas the rain was too late to save the corn while in the south, some stalks are tipping over in the wet ground.
The Wisconsin soybean crop is now listed as 54% good to excellent with 97% setting pods and 12% have turned color. While the crop is maturing ahead of average there are growing concerns about disease from the wet weather.
The heavy rains did bring the state’s pastures back to life, now rated 47% good to excellent condition. However, there was not a lot of hay made last week and anything that was cut is lost.