Wanted: Your memories of past droughts
Growing up as a farm kid in central North Dakota, I often heard about the drought of 1961. As a journalist, I covered droughts in 1988 and 2006. This summer, drought has reared its ugly head once...
View ArticleAnxious to start planting
I just got off the phone with a farmer in northeast North Dakota who just got of his tractor. No, he hadn’t been working in his fields; he’d been moving snow after the most recent storm. A year ago, he...
View ArticleRecent rains both help and hurt
Recent mid-May rains were a mixed blessing for farmers on the Northern Plains. Most needed more moisture. But some also were way behind on planting after a late spring, and the rains put them even...
View ArticleIn praise of subsoil moisture
Subsoil moisture is one of the greatest assets of farmers and ranchers in the Northern Plains. When producers have it, their crops can withstand a prolonged stretch of hot, dry weather. The summer of...
View ArticleSumming up 2013
Last week, in this space, I asked what Agweek readers ultimately will remember about the 2013 growing season on the Northern Plains. Beginning the year in drought? The torrential rains that followed?...
View ArticleStretch run for spring planting
If you’re an agriculturalist on the Northern Plains, there are two ways to look at the past week’s weather, which brought a much-needed stretch of warm, dry weather followed by more rain. If you’re a...
View ArticleThe sweet sound of rain in the night
I went out early this Sunday morning to check the rain gauge on my family farm in central North Dakota. It told me that a little more than an inch fell during the night. My ears told me that most of...
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Can You Find South Dakota On The Map?
WAUBAY, S.D. — A survey once found, or so the story goes, that a big chunk of Americans can’t locate South Dakota on a U.S. map. The “South” throws them, apparently, and they expect to find it along...
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