FARMERS HOPING FOR MORE RAIN

Until Sunday afternoon's rain showers, Southeast Missouri was a good rain away from having a good crop forecast this year. But despite the showers, the area still needs a good soaking, farmers and agriculture specialists say.

The National Weather Service at Paducah, Ky., reported that 0.76 inches of rain fell in Cape Girardeau County between noon and 3 Sunday, but areas farther south didn't report anything but a trace.

"You should consider yourself lucky if you were able to get it," Bobby Phipps said of the rainfall.

Phipps is a state cotton specialist at the University of Missouri Delta Research Center in Portageville, Mo., where little rain fell.

Rain is needed for most every crop that's been planted, but especially for the wheat that is flowering now.

"We need about an inch," Phipps said. "That would be wonderful. It will take that rain to catch up, but we need it to follow with some more."

The story repeats itself elsewhere.

Less rain than normal has fallen so far this year in Southern Illinois, Missouri and western Kentucky, increasing chances that another drought will dent crop production this summer, Kenneth Kunkel, a climatologist at the Midwestern Regional Climate Center in Champaign, Ill., said Friday.

The U.S. Drought Monitor report released Thursday says abnormally dry or drought conditions prevail in the southern third of Illinois, the southern half of Missouri and parts of western Kentucky.

The dry conditions were made worse by heavy rains north of St. Louis, which caused flooding in Minnesota, Iowa, and northern Illinois and at the same time drew winds out of the south, further drying the soil there, said Michael Palecki, a climatologist at the center.

But it's too early to say that the upcoming growing season will mirror last year's, when drought conditions hurt corn and soybean crops in the region.

What traditionally is the wettest time of the year is still ahead, Palecki said.

Weather forecasts for Southeast Missouri call for showers and some thunderstorms through Tuesday.

At work in the fields

Meanwhile farmers have been in the fields.

"Alfalfa and other hay is being cut now," said Terry Birk of the USDA Farm Service Agency at Jackson, Mo.

Cape Girardeau and Perry counties account for about two-thirds of the hay acreage in Southeast Missouri. Overall, the area annually grows about 145,000 tons on 96,000 acres.

Statewide, about 60 percent of corn is planted and about 6 percent of soybeans are in the soil. That's about 12 days ahead of last year's corn planting.

Corn planting is completed in the Southeast Missouri area. Cotton planting is 75 percent completed. Soybeans are about 25 percent planted, but farmers can plant soybeans into early June.

A crop report by the Missouri Agricultural Statistics Service and the Missouri Department of Agriculture show the winter wheat crop in mostly good to better condition.

Whether it stays that way depends on rain, and that goes for other crops besides winter wheat.

"We've gone from too cold and too wet to desert-like conditions," said Bill Wiebold, a University of Missouri agronomist in describing planting conditions in Missouri. "The topsoil is dry down three or four inches, which means farmers are planting above the soil moisture."

It's plenty dry," Phipps said. "We need moisture to get the seeds started."

The Associated Press contributed to this report.