Corn crop suffering thanks to Louisiana's hot summer
POINTE COUPEE PARISH, LA (WAFB) - Farmers are already expecting a hit to their pocket books, but this season, with Louisiana's brutal heat, combined with very little rain, it's not looking to be the best year.
"We were dry earlier on when the corn was smaller and stressed a little and usually, when corn does go through any stress, it doesn't recover from it," said Ray Schexnayder, who's from the southern end of Pointe Coupee Parish.
Schexnayder and his brothers have been farming since the 70s, rotating their crops. Right now, corn for livestock is what's in their fields.
"It's not been the best year, but it's doing all right," said Schexnayder.
Schexnayder ran his combine up the stalks, harvesting the corn as he went. The kernels were pulled off the cob, separated, and eventually all of that was offloaded.
Normally, he says they can get about 200 bushels an acre, but with barely any rain, much smaller ears of corn or damaged corn has been the problem. However, in the last few weeks, the pop up showers have helped with the crop, improving in the last few days.
"If you get enough of these good ones, you are in the 200, 210, 220 bushels range. These little ears, if the fields were made up of all of these, you are at about 100 bushels yield," said Schexnayder.
"This year will probably be slightly below average as a parish," said Mark Carrier, county agent for Pointe Coupee Parish.
Carrier says the northern end of the parish is actually worse off than the southern end, where Schexnayder's farm is located.
"Since April 22, we hadn't had a substantial rain over half an inch over the farm until two weeks ago," said Paul Roy with P&G Farms in Lettsworth.
Roy says in the nearly 330 acres he's already harvested, they only got about 90 to 100 bushels an acre, nearly a 50 percent decrease from the norm. He says he has hundreds of acres still left to harvest, and with the spotty showers picking up, he's hoping he can end the season with around 160 bushels an acre.
"Overall, it did impact us. There's no doubt that it did impact us," said Roy.
It's for this reason farmers have waited to harvest their corn a few weeks later than usual. The recent rain has helped the stalks turn green, somewhat improving the crops. As far as the financial hit to farmers, they say they won't know how bad the damage is until they are completely finished harvesting, which will be in a few weeks.
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