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Weather, winds help wet fields dry
South Dakota Limited precipitation, winds and temperatures facilitated drying of wet fields, allowing producers to get 6.1 days suitable for fieldwork statewide during the week ending May 20, according to the National Agricultural Statistics Service, South Dakota Field Office, May 21. Major farm activities included planting row crops, post-emergence spraying, fixing fence, and moving cattle to pasture. Precipitation occurred in isolated locations during the week, according to the State Climate Office of South Dakota. Because we are transitioning to mostly convective precipitation, the aerial coverage was very sporadic. Many storms dropped their heaviest rainfall between recording stations. The north central part of the state continues to lag in precipitation, accumulating less than half of average in the last 30 days and less than 70 percent of average over much of the northwest quarter. Some cooler temperatures occurred with some patchy frost as temperatures reached the mid-30s in some locations last Tuesday through Thursday. Temperatures ran above average for the fifth consecutive week. Only a few stations in the north and northeast parts of the state measured near-average temperatures. The overall dry, warm and windy conditions improved planting conditions and dried fields for continuation of fieldwork. Cool overnight temperatures resulted in patchy frost and limited changes in soil temperature. Topsoil moisture was rated at 15 percent surplus, down from 27 percent last week. Subsoil moisture was rated at 15 percent surplus, down from 24 percent last week. Dry, windy conditions allowedcornplanting to progress quickly to 76 percent complete compared to 48 percent last week.cornemergence proceeded to 38 percent, actually ahead of normal. There have been a few reports of soils drying so fast thatcornseedlings are struggling to break the surface. Soybean, Sorghum and sunflower plantings are closely following thecornwith plantings rated 26, 25 and 5 percent complete, respectively. Barley, oat and spring wheat seeding are nearly complete; while, emergence advanced to nearly normal levels. Winter wheat development now has 70 percent of the crop in the boot stage. Cattle, sheep, alfalfa, and range and pasture conditions all showed higher percentages in the good to excellent categories than last week. Alfalfa condition reported the largest increase at 7 percentage points higher than last week, with a rating of 83 percent good to excellent. Cattle moved to pastures advanced to 73 percent, ahead of both last year and the five-year average. Calving is rated at 94 percent complete, while lambing is virtually complete. B 2 5/28/07 4 Star NE Date: 5/23/07
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