The University of Illinois’ Todd Gleason did a crop tour last weekend to see the status of the Illinois corn crop for himself. In case you haven’t been following, the drought situation in Illinois and in most of the U.S. has effected the corn crop, as well as many other crops, and has speculators speculating about how much corn will actually be harvested this fall and whether that yield will be enough to go around.
Corn prices are spiking as a result. Livestock farmers are calling for a waiver of our country’s ethanol mandate to eliminate competition for corn. Foreign nations are checking in with Illinois farmers to make sure there will corn for them to purchase. Media outlets are preying on misinformation and scaring the American public about federal crop insurance programs.
It’s getting ugly.
But when Gleason drove through corn country, some of the best corn producing counties in the state, what he found wasn’t quite as scary as what we all thought.
After watching his video, you might want to view the following photos in more depth. The points on the map coorespond to the photos in the collage.
The moral of the story here is that no one is going to know what yields look like until we actually get the combines out and harvest. Yes, the drought will have an effect. Yes, the GMO varieties that farmers plant most of will help the plants weather the storm so to speak. Yes, farmers are typically a little pessimistic about crop yields in bad seasons, but who wouldn’t be? They have hours of labor, thousands and thousands of dollars, and their entire livelihood waiting on this crop.
I look forward to the fall months when we can finally put this year behind us and when, I hope, we will all be pleasantly surprised with what we find.
Lindsay Mitchell
ICGA/ICMB Project Coordinator
Todd come south of I 64 and see what you find……..
I’m a journalist in southern Illinois and I’m not sensationalizing anything. I’ve watched grown men break down and cry because their corn crop only averaged 10 bushels an acre this year. The accusation that the media is scaring the American public about federally-subsidized crop insurance is outrageously inaccurate.
It’s actually quite the opposite– legislators (and others who stand to benefit from cutting the farm bill budget) are fudging the numbers about the SNAP program, more commonly known as food stamps around here, in order to stall the bill in the House… probably until after the election. In fact, abuse of the SNAP program is at its lowest rate ever.
One in seven American households utilizes the program to some extent and if Congress cuts millions of dollars out of the budget for SNAP, which is a USDA program, some Americans WILL die of hunger. In addition, the GOP’s version of the House’s Farm Bill would revoke the free school meal thousands of American children are currently provided. That may be the only meal they eat everyday.
Even if you buy into the propaganda that all people who receive food stamps are unemployed drug addicts, why punish their innocent children? This is America. People, especially children and the elderly which are the people SNAP targets, shouldn’t be dying of hunger on a daily basis simply because people don’t want to pay higher taxes.
How do you live with yourself?
If you live in a region where water is very contaminated, it would be wise to
consider another solution such as differing filters that you can fit around your home (shower filter, faucet filter
or even a whole house filtration system which would ensure all of your water is as
a good as getting it direct from one of natures springs. The EPA recognizes activated carbon
filters as the best filters for removing THMs and VOCs (volatile
organic chemicals), contaminants often found in our municipal drinking water supply.
At first half of the 20th Century, there was more death from microorganisms elements
such as cholera in water.