Relief for farmers being sought for drought and rain

Drought grips parts of Minnesota while six counties struggle with aftermath of too much moisture.

By BOB VON STERNBERG, Star Tribune

Last update: September 15, 2009 - 11:39 PM

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After appearing to ease a bit with the rain that fell in August, the drought that has gripped much of Minnesota for more than a year has settled back in.

Temperatures that seem more suited to midsummer than September have been accompanied by a renewed dry stretch that produced what the state climatology office calls "negligible" rainfall.

During the first two weeks of September, a grand total of .01 inch of rain has fallen in the Twin Cities. That's 1.4 inches below normal.

The drought, most severe in east-central Minnesota, began to take hold in June 2008 and has escalated to what the U.S. Drought Monitor describes as "moderate to severe."

The region is running a precipitation deficit of as much as 12 inches below normal, according to the monitor. And there's no immediate prospect for relief: No substantial rain is forecast for at least a week.

Meanwhile, six Minnesota counties have the opposite problem. On Tuesday, Gov. Tim Pawlenty asked federal officials to declare an agricultural disaster in Kittson, Lake of the Woods, Marshall, Pennington, Roseau and Koochiching counties.

Farmers in those counties "have experienced significant losses due to excessively wet conditions in 2008 and 2009," Pawlenty wrote in a letter to Agriculture Secretary Tom Vilsack.

If the disaster is declared, farmers would become eligible for low-interest emergency loans from the federal Farm Service Agency.

Starting last fall, the region's soil was saturated by heavy rainfall, followed by flooding in the spring and unseasonably cool weather. As a result, some farmers never planted this year's crops, and losses for corn, soybeans and several other crops exceeded 30 percent.

BOB VON STERNBERG