Local farmers needed rain but got flooded fields

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by Katie Guathier

Story Created: Jun 15, 2012 at 5:49 PM CDT

Story Updated: Jun 28, 2012 at 4:05 PM CDT

We need the rain. That's the phrase you've been hearing a lot from farmers over the past two weeks.

While a good soaking can be good for the crops, it's not all good news. In some places heavy storms last night made rivers swell and roads impassable.

The starched ground could surely use the moisture. But it also brought flood warnings.

So was it the right kind of rain or did it cause an extra headache for local farmers?

"I had exactly four inches in my gauge," said Virgil Brockman, Deweese Farmer.

"Five inches and twenty hundredths," said Marlene Hubl, Farmer.

"In this whole area it seems like it was four inches or better," said Brockman.

Leaving farmers with a very sticky situation. You can see here crops were drenched.

"Sweet corn laying on the ground," said Brockman.

Even drowning in the rainfall.

"We have some standing water," said Hubl.

The blast of rain caused the Little Blue River to swell making some roads impassable.

"The road was washed over about 3 to 4 places where it had flooded over and it took the gravel off the roads, of course," said Hubl.

But water isn't the only threat from the severe storms. Up to tennis ball size hail was reported in Clay County.

"This year our wheat got hailed off about 100 percent twice so we had no wheat left," said Brockman

Of course, the farmers desperately need the moisture.

"Our subsoil is down to zero because of no snow. That was where we get our subsoil from," said Brockman.

Farmers will say that they need the rain, but this field here is pretty soaked and they prefer a different type.

"A nice slow rain would do us a lot more good than the heavy rain because it just washes off down to the creeks," said Hubl.

"We're going to need rain, timely rains through especially July and August when the corn and beans are using a lot of it. That's when we're going to need timely rains," said Brockman.

Virgil said they need at least an inch of rain every week to ten days in order to keep the crops up to par.

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