Labor Day Has Farmers in Northern Illinois Still Laboring to Salvage Crops

KINGSTON, ILLINOIS - Labor Day brought no relief for the farmers of northern Illinois.  Farmers have been working extra hard this summer through extreme heat and drought to make sure there's a crop for harvest. 

Brian Deverell's crop consulting business is doing well because of the drought, but he's had to lend a helping hand to his father, Russ, who's a farmer in Kingston, Illinois.  Deverell says the combination of drought and heat rendered pesticides and other scientific farming efforts useless.  He says some of his clients had to start pulling manual labor to keep up.

"Our conventional herbicides weren't working, so we were doing things like going out and manually removing weeds or cultivating fields, which is a time consuming process," said Deverell.

Many of Deverell's clients even had to replant complete fields after heat and drought rendered them dried and withered, left for dead.  Providing for the family farm's pigs has also involved working harder.  The lack of corn has the price for grain feed rising.  With less corn, farmers have had to consult Deverell on what to do.

"A lot of farmers worry if they have sold too much corn ahead of time," said Deverell.  "They'll consult with us on, 'Well how much do they really have out there.'"

The National Weather Service's drought forecast through the end of November marks improving rain conditions for farmers in and around Rockford.  The map lists northern Illinois as improving, but with the corn crop already mature, any additional rain won't help.

"We could help some of the soybeans but even there, once we start seeing them turn yellow, there's not much you can do further," Deverell said.

Brandon Arnold, WTVO/WQRF meteorologist, says although the rain might not help now, it may bode well for the future.

"The rain that we're going to be seeing over the coming weeks and months is still very important because that helps set us up for next year," said Arnold.

"We still need to get that rain especially during the winter months to make sure we don't have a repeat of what we saw this summer."

Farmers may not have to worry about next year having a drought.  Agriculture Bio-Tech firm Monsanto just rolled out drought-resistant corn seed, which according to reports say farmers are very interested in for next year.