Heavy rain in southern Arkansas KO’s hay production, closes roads

LEWISVILLE, Ark. — Heavy rain in southwest Arkansas closed roads and brought hay production to a halt in Lafayette County, said Jerri Dew, the county’s extension staff chair, said on Thursday.

A stalled front enabled rain to continue falling over the same area starting overnight Tuesday into Wednesday morning. The National Weather Service at Shreveport, Louisiana, which covers parts of southwest Arkansas, issued a flash flood emergency for portions of Columbia, Hempstead, Lafayette and Nevada counties and warned of life-threatening flash flooding “particularly in the Stamps, Bucker, Lewisville and Patmos areas.”

Flood damage to Arkansas Highway 98 in southern Arkansas. (Image courtesy Arkansas Department of Transportation)

According to the National Weather Service, northern Lafayette County saw the highest totals, estimated at 6-8 inches. A CoCoRaHs station — Community Collaborative Rain, Hail and Snow network — recorded 7 inches in Hempstead County. El Dorado, in Union County, recorded 4 inches, which was a record total for July 12. The old record of 2.6 inches was set in 2002.

“The flooding yesterday was not as bad in most of the cropland — for once — as it was in the northeast corner of the county which is mostly timber, some hay,” Dew said. “It was a mess up here. A lot of flooding.”

Roads closed

“U.S. Highway 82 was even closed for a time due to complete flooding,” she said, adding that she couldn’t remember that happening before.

According to the Arkansas Department of Transportation, both lanes of Arkansas 98 remained closed Thursday because of a washout. The department tweeted an image of damage to the highway.

“My neighbor keeps weather data for Lamartine and he had 12.77 inches of rain in his electronic rain gauge within a 12-hour span yesterday morning,” Dew said. “We have a lot of road damage over there.”

Crop damage

Dew that in visiting one of the farmers in the bottoms, he told her he didn’t get as much rain as the northern part of the county, but Wednesday’s rain added to the effects of previous events.

Road crew in Columbia County repairing damage following heavy rain on Wednesday (U of A System Division of Agriculture photo by Jerri Dew)

“They have had one storm after another come through for weeks now,” she said. “A lot of corn has been blown down, there has been a lot of hail damage and water is standing in the fields. Dew said that in driving through the area on Tuesday, she “observed a lot of yellowing corn. I am sure water is the majority of the problem.”

“Hay production has come to a standstill,” she said. “There are hayfields from one end of the county to the other that needed to be cut three weeks ago. Producers cannot catch a break to cut because we have showers almost daily.

“It is mid-July and some producers have not completed their second cutting yet. It is all adding up to make a short year on hay and a lot of it is not going to be good quality,” Dew said.

The Cooperative Extension Service is the outreach arm of the University of Arkansas System Division of Agriculture.

To learn about extension programs in Arkansas, contact your local Cooperative Extension Service agent or visit www.uaex.uada.edu. Follow us on Twitter and Instagram at @AR_Extension. To learn more about Division of Agriculture research, visit the Arkansas Agricultural Experiment Station website: https://aaes.uada.edu/. Follow us on Twitter at @ArkAgResearch. To learn more about the Division of Agriculture, visit https://uada.edu/. Follow us on Twitter at @AgInArk.

Hay production drops to its lowest level in 11 years

by George Jared (gjared@talkbusiness.net)

Fertilizer prices and drought last year decimated hay production in the United States. The country had its biggest decline in 11 years with stocks at their lowest level since data collection began, according to the National Agricultural Statistics Service (NASS).

The Natural State didn’t fare much better.

Arkansas farmers harvested 1.09 million hay acres last year, an 8% decline when compared to the previous year. Those acres yielded two tons per acre, a 10% yearly drop in yield. About 2.19 million tons of hay was produced, a 16% drop.

https://talkbusiness.net/2023/02/hay-production-drops-to-its-lowest-level-in-11-years/

US hay stocks fall to lowest level since ’74; Arkansas hay production down in 2022

By Mary Hightower
U of A System Division of Agriculture

FAYETTEVILLE, Ark. — High fertilizer prices and drought in 2022 handed hay production in the United States its biggest decline in 11 years with stocks at their lowest level since data collection began, according to the National Agricultural Statistics Service.

The stats were part of the Jan. 12 Crop Production Summary from NASS, which is part of the U.S. Department of Agriculture. The report includes information about all U.S. crops, their production, acreage, and yield. NASS places hay in two categories, alfalfa and “other hay,” the latter being relevant to the Southeastern U.S. 

Drought and high fertilizer prices took a significant bite out of hay production across the U.S. Extension Economist James Mitchell expects farmers will pay more for hay in the current marketing year. (U of A System Division of Agriculture file photo by Lauren Husband)

According to the summary, May 1 hay stocks were tight, totaling 16.77 million tons or 7 percent lower year over year.

“May 1 stocks, combined with lower 2022 hay production, put hay supplies at the lowest level on record since the data began in 1974,” said James Mitchell, extension economist for the University of Arkansas System Division of Agriculture. “The previous record low in hay supplies was in 2021.”

Production declines
Nationwide, other hay production totaled 64.84 million tons in 2022, down 9 percent from the prior year, with Arkansas seeing a 16 percent decline. Texas, the nation’s largest hay-producing state, produced 6.15 million tons, a 40 percent decline compared to 2021.

“Most Southern Plains and Southeast states had double-digit hay production declines,” said Mitchell said.

Mississippi saw a 16 percent decline, Tennessee a 13 percent decline, and Kentucky, a 20 percent decline. Florida bucked the trend, seeing a 7 percent increase in hay production. 

“USDA’s estimate for Arkansas is much better than what I would have predicted last summer,” Mitchell said. Based on conversations with producers last year, he said “I was expecting a decline closer to 25 percent.

“It was hard to predict whether we would get late-season rain last summer,” Mitchell said. “It was even hard to predict whether a late-season rain would help us make up for the severe production losses we had in July. Conditions improved enough in September for us to make up for some of that loss.”

Yields down
“Expensive fertilizer and poor precipitation impacted yields,” he said. “U.S. hay yields averaged 1.87 tons per acre or 6 percent lower year over year. Yields dropped 9 percent in Arkansas to two tons per acre. Neighboring Oklahoma and Texas saw yields averaging 1.25 tons per acre and 1.50 tons per acre, respectively.”

Overall, other hay acreage fell 2 percent to 34.63 acres. Arkansas’ hay acres declined by 5 percent, while Texas saw a 25 percent reduction in hay acres in 2022.

Mitchell said that “declining cattle inventories, expensive inputs, and high crop prices all likely contributed to the decline in 2022 hay acreage.”

Higher prices
Mitchell said farmer would likely be paying more for hay.

“Like other commodities, price comparisons are based on the marketing year,” he said. The hay marketing year begins in May and ends in April.

“For the May 2021-April 2022 marketing year, prices averaged $147 per ton,” Mitchell said. “For the May 2022-April 2023 marketing year, we forecast prices to average $170 per ton.”

To learn about extension programs in Arkansas, contact your local Cooperative Extension Service agent or visit www.uaex.uada.edu. Follow us on Twitter and Instagram at @AR_Extension. To learn more about Division of Agriculture research, visit the Arkansas Agricultural Experiment Station website: https://aaes.uada.edu. Follow on Twitter at @ArkAgResearch. To learn more about the Division of Agriculture, visit https://uada.edu/. Follow us on Twitter at @AgInArk.

Notice from the Arkansas Department of Agriculture (Share Post)

(Photo by David George)

Arkansas Cattlemen's Association

All of Arkansas is in a drought for the first time in 10 years. Conditions are rough for all of agriculture.

Hay production has all but stopped in the majority of the state, with estimates of drastically less hay harvested this year and a need to start feeding it soon because of limited grass.

Cattle are being sold at a drastically increased rate at Arkansas livestock markets because of limited grazing.

The ACA and Governor Asa Hutchinson have requested a USDA Drought Disaster Declaration for the entire state of Arkansas.

The ACA has also requested $3.5 million for the Arkansas Department of Agriculture to create a new program to help producers through this time - the Arkansas Emergency Feed Assistance Transportation Program.

This program would provide financial assistance to producers on transportation costs of feedstuffs, including hay, during this drought.

How can you help? Share this post to raise awareness, be prepared to contact your legislators if we make a call to action, and take care of yourself and your herd in this heat.