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Snow, ice storms make farm life challengingSouth Dakota A late January ice storm left some producers without electricity, which has caused problems maintaining a water supply for livestock, according to the National Agricultural Statistics Service, South Dakota Field Office, Feb. 1. Average snow depth for the state on Jan. 31 is 10.9 inches. County road conditions in the state were rated at 90 percent open and 10 percent difficult. Township road conditions were rated at 71 percent open, 21 percent difficult and 8 percent closed. Major farm activities include moving snow, hauling and marketing grain, moving hay closer to home, and tending to livestock. A major ice storm was the big weather story of the month, according to the State Climate Office of South Dakota. Early month cold gave way to mid-month warming for the state. Temperatures which started the month quite cold, with some near-record temperatures early in the month, rebounded very warmly in the middle of the month. Overall, the month was generally 2 to 5 F cooler than average over much of the east. The Black Hills and the far southwest, where the snow cover was minimal actually saw above average temperatures of 2 to 4 F. The high temperature for the month was at Spearfish at 62 F; the low temperature was Madison at -34 F. Precipitation was near to above average in the eastern 2/3 of the state. Areas of the Black Hills and southwest received much less precipitation during January. Precipitation that fell as rain and refroze or initially as freezing rain caused problems Jan. 23 and 24 leading to power outages and icy roads. The highest precipitation total was 1.57 inch at Mission; the lowest total was 0.06 inch at DuPree. The solid and consistent snow pack over much of the eastern part of the state has allowed 4 inch-depth soil temperatures to warm from below. All soils are frozen at 4 inches. But the depth of the freezing is fairly shallow over most of the state. Only the more open areas of the western part of the state have soils frozen to deep levels. Cottonwood was the coolest at 27 F; five stations were the warmest at 31 F. Despite the amount of snow on the ground producers were able to harvest some corn left in the field from last fall. The month of January finished with 5 percent of the corn crop left to be harvested. Strong winds have exposed both winter wheat and alfalfa fields to the cold temperatures causing some producers to worry about winter kill. Winter wheat condition is rated as 4 percent poor, 23 percent fair, 65 percent good, and 8 percent excellent, and snow cover is rated at 13 percent poor, 63 percent adequate, and 24 percent excellent. Alfalfa snow cover is rated at 5 percent poor, 61 percent adequate and 34 percent excellent.
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