Ag Weather Forum

I recently traded in my meteorologist role at DTN for a few days in the combine as I helped with corn and soybean harvest on my family's farm in southwest Minnesota. While sitting in the combine seat, I couldn't help but notice the large cracks in the soil between the corn rows. Our farm happens to be amid a moderate to severe drought and precipitation during the past 60 days is more than 4 inches below average.

The dry conditions plaguing some areas of the Midwest could be in for some relief toward the end of October or early November as the upper-air weather pattern could change for a few weeks.

In the most recent USDA NASS weekly national Crop Progress report, released Oct. 15, the percentage of short subsoil moisture exceeds 30% across Minnesota, Michigan, Iowa, Illinois, Indiana and Missouri. Iowa and Illinois take the cake with 45% of subsoil moisture rated as short. While dry conditions have allowed corn and soybean harvest to be ahead of schedule for many, soil across much of the Corn Belt could use more moisture ahead of the upcoming winter.

Through the first half of October, much of the Corn Belt had a weather pattern dominated by upper-air ridging that kept conditions mostly dry and temperatures above average for much of the region. However, remnants of Hurricane Helene tagged the southern Corn Belt that led to more widespread rainfall. For the second half of October, we could see a change in the upper-air weather pattern across the United States. The pattern change could mean increased precipitation chances for parts of the Corn Belt, but temperatures are still favored to be above average.

Upper-air troughs could become a bit more frequent across the western U.S. through the end of the month with upper-air ridging favored across the eastern U.S. When an upper-air pattern like this sets up across the U.S., the central U.S. will be sandwiched between the trough and ridge, which is a favorable area for storm systems and precipitation to develop.

This change in the upper-air pattern coincides with a change in the Madden Julian Oscillation (MJO). The MJO is an area of clouds, winds and rain that moves east across the tropics and can influence the weather across the U.S. Toward the end of October into early November, the MJO will lead to an upper-air trough dominating the far eastern Pacific Ocean or the western U.S. and systems from the West could drift into the Corn Belt from time to time.

Long-range model guidance hints at a few bands of precipitation developing from the southeast Plains into the Eastern Midwest. However, if this forecast holds, places like western Iowa, the Dakotas, western Minnesota, and eastern Nebraska could miss out on the much-needed moisture. The latest U.S. Drought Monitor, which was released Thursday, shows pockets of moderate and severe drought expanding across some of these areas. While it is still too far out to say exactly how much rain will fall with these bands of precipitation at the end of this month or early November, any moisture would be a step in the right direction for boosting soil moisture.

On my family's farm, we were fortunate enough to finish our bean harvest during the past weekend, but we still have half our corn crop to harvest on top of some tillage and fertilizer application. While it has been nice to keep plugging away at the harvest with relatively dry conditions, we're also hoping for more rain. With subsoil moisture being as short as it is, we are considering more shallow tillage so we can keep as much subsoil moisture as possible.

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Teresa Wells can be reached at teresa.wells@dtn.com

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