Crops Still Standing on KMOT-TV North Dakota's NBC News Leader

Crops Still Standing | Video

Retha Colclasure

10/29/2009

The weather has been a constant battle for farmers all year long.

Early in the season, they had to wait until fields were dry enough to plant.

Throughout the summer, they had to wait for the sun, so their crops would grow.

Now, many farmers are still waiting to harvest.

Farmers take out crop insurance to cover their crops in case of things like hail.

But for small grains, that crop insurance deadline will expire on Saturday.

And not everyone will finish harvesting by then.

"I brought the combine over here on the 30th of September and we managed to get half of it cut two weeks ago. And that`s it, we`ve been sitting ever since," says Hazen farmer John Weinand. He has been waiting to harvest this 75 acres of safflower for 30 days.

"I was here the 30th of September and it was still too green," Weinand says. "You wouldn`t have been able to harvest it yet. I was on top of it, just didn`t give me any opportunity."

Even the little bit he did manage to harvest during a short dry period was high moisture.

"It`s been frustrating," says Weinand. "This gray hair isn`t free."

Worst yet, his crop insurance is set to expire on the field in just a few days. It`s a deadline most producers have never run up against before, but this year, it`s all too common.

"When you have weather situations like this you need to be mindful, most people are mindful of just trying to get the crop off. We can`t arbitrarily just miss a date simply because we`re working on 99 other things," says Dan Wogsland, of the North Dakota Grain Growers Association.

Wogsland says he`s never seen a harvest like this one, and says producers who are in a tight spot should talk to their insurance agents.

"It`s far too costly not to be covered, especially in these economic times," he says.

Weinand says he already opened a claim on his safflower field, but his insurance agency is giving him another two weeks to try and harvest it anyway.

Even though this crop is still standing here, there`s still a chance to harvest it, and the quality doesn`t look so bad either.

Even if the weather doesn`t cooperate, and he can`t get to it.

"It`s only one crop out of the total," Weinand says. "You`re up against Mother Nature. This time she wins."

He says he doesn`t plant just to collect crop insurance. He wants a crop.

Safflower is mostly grown for birdseed, or for oil.

Weinand says in addition to his safflower field, he`s still waiting for his corn fields and sunflower fields to dry so he can start harvesting them.

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