For farmers, the drought of 2012 is officially a disaster.
Charlie Bob Parks of Mitchell already knew that.
“The corn in this county, Orange County, surrounding areas — some of it is just zero,” he said. “It’ll ever make anything.”
He would normally anticipate a harvest of 160 to 180 bushels per acre.
This year, he said, he’ll be lucky to get 20 to 30 bushels per acre. At that rate, it’s not worth running a combine through the field to get the corn. The cost of fuel and other expenses will be more than what farmers will make selling the grain.
“I’ve never experienced this to know what to do with it now,” he said.
“Even in 1988 (the last severe drought) we did have a crop of sorts. But this year — just nothing. There’s absolutely nothing.”
He’s holding out hope for soybeans.
“The soybeans have a shot to make half a crop if we have decent weather over the next month or so,” he said.
Then he noted that July and August are often the driest months of the year.
Federal help
On Friday the U.S. Department of Agriculture designated 36 Indiana counties as what it calls “primary natural disaster areas” because of the losses caused by extreme drought. The designation means additional assistance through the Farm Services Agency. Lawrence, Orange, Martin and Greene counties are all on that disaster list.
In addition, farmers in 19 more counties — including Jackson, Monroe and Washington — also were made eligible for disaster assistance because they are adjacent to the 36 designated counties.
Janelle Springer, FSA executive director in Orange County, said the disaster declaration means farmers can quality for low-interest loans through the Commodity Credit Corp. The loans are intended to help farmers make up for the drought losses.
Also Friday, the FSA announced that 22 counties —including Lawrence, Orange, Martin and Monroe — are authorized for emergency grazing on Conservation Reserve Program land. That means farmers can, with prior FSA approval, open more land to their livestock for grazing. Land that is in the Conservation Reserve Program cannot be used for farm purposes. But with this designation, farmers can use it. Also, some farmers will be able harvest hay from those areas after the wildlife nesting season (July 16 or Aug. 2, depending upon the farmer’s contract), Springer said.
In either case, she said, there is a 10 percent reduction in the rental payments farmers normally receive for CRP land.
“They need to come in and see us before they get out there and start cutting,” Springer said. (Jim Hudelson, FSA’s executive director in Lawrence County, is on vacation.)
Farmers also should contact their respective FSA office for information about the various disaster programs. And Springer urged farmers to contact FSA and their crop insurance agents before destroying corn or soybeans they had intended to take to harvest.
The USDA also is reminding farmers to keep thorough records of livestock or crop losses, as well as additional expenses for such things as feed purchased because of lost supplies.
“I know we’re going to be busy starting Monday,” Springer said.
Insurance
Parks said he did not know what to expect from the federal programs. But he said most farmers have crop insurance that will recover some of their expenses.
There are different levels of insurance coverage, he said, and the payments tend to be based on market prices, which figure to be high because of crop shortages.
“It’s not quite as bleak as it looks,” Parks said.
But the insurance coverage won’t make up for the lack of grain in bins or the lack of profit from a big harvest.
“Basically, you’ll be able to go another year,” he said.