After a pair of rains that hit some areas over the southeast, farmers are taking a look at how much moisture they have with a clear forecast ahead.

A lot of that came in during seeding, with Agrologist Edgar Hammermeister saying that did delay some seeding operations.

"We were fortunate to have gotten the snow that we did in the springtime to build up some soil moisture and give the crops an opportunity to germinate. Seeding was a little bit delayed because of the late melt, but we got going."

"The conditions were quite variable throughout the southeast in spring. Thundershowers were moving through and in some locations were bringing rain that just was not welcome at the time, causing a lot of issues trying to finish seeding. In other places, it missed most of the rains and so we were glad to have had the moisture to start the crop.”

A few farmers have even had drought-like conditions through bad luck since last year's harvest.

"Because of the spottiness of the spring rains and maybe a little bit of variability of where the snow build-up was before melt, there are some places that have gone through a fairly significant drought. That heat that we had here at the end of May, beginning of June that really caught the crop off guard and moved it along quicker, and in some circumstances the crops got quite stressed.“ 

Hammermeister has also been talking to local farmers; one who owns land north of him isn't looking too good in terms of crop growth, even though his neighbours are closer to average.

He's hoping that more moisture comes down during the summer to keep crops fed.

“Overall, I would say that crop establishment was good where we could seed, but we're needing timely moisture just to keep things moving along. That heat stress, it's going to be interesting how we see that impacting fields here at the end because it's unusual for us to have gotten the heat that early.” 

The incoming seasonal temperatures will also help with that as less moisture will be evaporating.

“With more moderate temperatures the plants use the available moisture to try and build canopy and build yield so the more moderate temperatures are absolutely welcome.”