From the Wall Street Jornal:

The overall U.S. economy may be struggling, but you wouldn't know it from a visit to the Farm Belt.

The signs of a land-grab mania are everywhere. The Des Moines Register reported this week that two tracts in O'Brien County in the northwestern part of Iowa sold for $9,700 an acre, while one land broker estimated that farmland has appreciated on average by about $1,000 an acre since the end of the summer.

By comparison, Iowa farmland values averaged $4,371 per acre in 2009, and $5,321 for the highest grade properties.

See The Farm Belt Boom at the Wall Street Journal for more.