The latest USDA crop report shows Missouri ranks fourth in total prevented plant acres in the nation behind South Dakota, Illinois and Ohio.

Missouri farmers reported 1.388 million acres combined of corn and soybeans as prevented plant. That number is less than the 1.663 million acres the state saw go unplanted in 2015. However, this year the acres flip-flopped.

More corn acres were reported as prevented plant than soybeans. Missouri farmers claimed 744,273 corn acres as prevented plant. That number is above 2015 figures by more than 235,000 acres. However, this year, despite floods and rains, Missouri is not suffering as much as states to the north and east.

Topping the nation with fewer corn acres in the ground was South Dakota with 2.85 million acres, followed by Illinois with 1.14 million acres. Both Minnesota at nearly 1 million acres and Ohio at 880,000 were worse off than Missouri in terms of prevented plant corn acres.

However, when it comes to prevented plant on soybean acres alone, Missouri ranks third in the nation. South Dakota once again led the country in soybean prevented plant acres with 850,864, while Ohio came in second with 598,981. Missouri rounded out the top three with 477,431 prevented plant soybean acres — less than half the acreage reported in 2015 when Missouri led the nation with 1.02 million acres of prevented plant soybeans.

Farmers across the state also reported not being able to plant 18,000 acres of cotton, 61,245 acres of rice and 2,285 acres of sorghum.

Local issue

Below is an interactive map showing prevented plant acres by county. Click on the blue location tab to see how many acres.

National front

Nationally, farmers reported they were not able to plant crops on about 19.4 million acres in 2019. This is the most prevented plant acres reported since USDA’s Farm Service Agency began releasing the report in 2007 — and about 17 million acres more than reported at this time last year.

Of those prevented plant acres, more than 73% were in 12 Midwestern states, where heavy rainfall and flooding this year has prevented many producers from planting mostly corn, soybeans and wheat.

The report also showed that producers planted 2.71 million acres of cover crops so far in 2019, compared with 2.14 million acres at this time in 2018 and 1.88 million at this time in 2017.

To help make cover crops a more viable option, USDA’s Risk Management Agency adjusted the haying and grazing date of cover crops, and USDA’s Natural Resources Conservation Service held sign-ups in select states that offered producers assistance in planting cover crops.

Meanwhile, USDA added other flexibilities to help affected producers, including adjusting the deadline to file acreage reports in select states.

To find more information, view the Aug. 12 report. The report collects information from crop acreage reports as of Aug. 1, which producers filed with FSA to maintain program eligibility and to calculate losses for various disaster assistance programs.

The crop acreage data report outlines the number of acres planted, prevented from planting, and failed by crop — county and state.