New Year Snows Boost WheatNew Year Snows Boost Wheat

The drought on the plains is far from broken, but the decent snow that arrived heading into the New Year has helped breathed new life into our wheat.

In the final week of 2012, our farm received snowfall accumulations of 7-8". The general rule of thumb is 10 inches of snow equals 1 inch of rain…depending on how heavy or fluffy it is. Figuring the snow we received in the last week was "normal," that translates to about 0.7-0.8" of precip. That's half of all the moisture we've received since the end of September.

Decent snow that arrived heading into the New Year has helped wheat.

Getting moisture as snow is also a bonus since nearly all the moisture will move down into the soil with very little of it evaporating. This is a huge benefit to developing the plant's root system, which has been very underdeveloped from the drought. Yield potential, though, is still far from being established.