Rain Could Bring Pasture Improvement

OMAHA (DTN) -- Pasture and range conditions have deteriorated in quality over the past week but have the possibility of improvement with recent and continuing showers.

Many states saw a decrease in the good-to-excellent category this week. Colorado and Montana saw the biggest decrease of 11 and 9 points, respectively. This moves Colorado to 36% and Montana to 9% here. These two states have also seen an increase in the very-poor-to-poor category, with Colorado marking 34% of pastures here and Montana at 61%, according to USDA NASS's weekly Crop Progress report on Monday.

Decreases were also seen in Missouri, Wyoming, Nebraska, Iowa, Texas, Kansas, and Oklahoma, with 1 to 5 points fewer of good-to-excellent pastures. Missouri, after starting the year with a large percentage of pasture and range in the good-to-excellent category, is now down to 31% and had a 5-point increase in the very-poor-to-poor category at 35%.

Wyoming also saw a 5-point decrease in good-to-excellent pasture, now at 20%, and a 6-point increase in very poor to poor at 54%.

Midwest states of Iowa, Illinois and Wisconsin saw deterioration of pasture quality and while Iowa still has 60% of pastures marked good to excellent, Illinois is only at 16%. Wisconsin is still at 63% good to excellent, even with a 5-point drop.

The Southwest states received moisture leading to improvement in pasture and range conditions. Nevada saw no change in conditions and is still at 90% in the very-poor-to-poor category. Arizona saw a 7-point improvement, moving to 80% in very poor to poor and a 3-point improvement of good-to-excellent pastures at 9%. Utah saw a big improvement with a 12-point increase in good-to-excellent pastures at 41%. Utah also saw a 17-point decrease in very-poor-to-poor pastures and now only has 14% here.

DTN Ag Meteorologist John Baranick said showers could continue for the Central and Southern Plains and then move eastward. While these rains are unfavorable for corn and soybean harvest, it is more favorable for establishing winter wheat and improving pastures.

Baranick said scattered showers are expected to continue through the end of the week in the Midwestern states, also delaying harvest, but improving drought conditions.

"Drier weather that follows for the weekend and next week will promote harvest," he added.

See the accompanying maps for more on the changes in various states.

National Pasture and Range Conditions (48 states)

	Very poor	Poor	Fair	Good	Excellent
48 States	13	23	30	26	8
Previous week	13	22	30	28	7
Previous year	20	25	30	20	5

Jennifer Carrico can be reached at jennifer.carrico@dtn.com

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