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Hail meeting encourages farmers to explore options Tuesday, June 23, 2009
Agri News staff writer
LAWLER, Iowa -- When Don Blazek Jr. and the other Seed Solutions Group partners quickly organized a hail meeting for Friday morning, they were expecting 25. Twice that number showed up at Blazek's machine shed to find out what their options are after hail damaged an estimated 150,000 acres of crops late June 17 and early June 18.
Some crops between Lawler and Protivin and near Waucoma were damaged so severely that fields look bare.
Tony Utley, an agronomist with Five Star Cooperative's Lawler branch, said hail damage stretches from north of Lourdes to Hawkeye in a band 25 miles long and 10 miles wide in Howard, Chickasaw and Fayette counties. The worst of the damage is in two, three-mile-wide and six-mile-long stretches, one northwest of Lawler and the other west of Waucoma.
"Damage ranged from total crop loss in the worst areas to moderate damage," Utley said. "Farmers will have to assess their crops to see if they can keep the stands or if they need to replant. This is the worst I've ever seen this early in the year, and it's the most widespread."
Brian Lang, Iowa State University Extension agronomist, said an estimated 10,000 acres was devastated.
After the storm, Blazek said he and the other Seed Solutions Group partners decided the best thing they could do would be to pull together resource people and host a meeting so farmers could make decisions.
Seed Solutions partners include Blazek, the Farmers Mill at Protivin, John Mahr of Cresco and Steve Maley, who is the company's seed agronomist. They sell NK and Crow's seed.
Lang and Maley told farmers to check with their crop and hail insurance agents and seed dealers before they do anything. Lang said it is best to wait seven to 10 days after hail to assess injury.
"However, some fields are obviously devastated," Lang said. "Work with your hail and crop insurance people as to whether you might be able to act on some field situations prior to the normal wait period. Agreements such as leaving check strips are common."
Lang and Maley said farmers need to read herbicide labels of products used if replanting a field to a different crop.
Soybeans are more complicated and assessments require considerable calculations after field evaluations are accomplished, Lang said. There may be deferrals to harvest.
John Cuvelier, owner of Insurance Associates of Lawler, said that while adjusters can't make a final determination on crops at this point, they can sit down with farmers and explain how their hail and multiple peril crop insurance policies work.
"Everybody can get together and find out where they're at," Cuvelier said. "You don't have to wait 10 days to have someone come out and talk to you. At least find out what your options are now." |
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