Green Grass

Thursday afternoon it sure was nice to see green grass! Louise and I drove down to visit Steve in Indianapolis. As we approached southeastern Iowa I noticed the thermometer in the car was showing the outside temperature was 70 degrees. We stopped for gas in Peoria Illinois and the temperature was 82 degrees! We talked to one of the residents and he said it was 17 degrees last weekend! Wednesday Thursday and Friday were really nice and then this weekend it was going to get really cold again with rain and snow.

Gordy mentioned on the air Friday that there was a tweet going around that all the brokers were talking about. A farmer was planting corn in southern Iowa. That meant that the Crop Progress Report on Monday afternoon will show great corn planting progress! I do not know what the crop planting progress will show in the report Monday afternoon but I know what I saw driving through the heart of the corn belt.

We drove from Faribault to Mason City and then angled across Iowa to the Quad-Cities. Then across Illinois, Peoria, Champaign and DeKalb County, some of the most productive corn land in the United States. Then into Indiana and south to Indianapolis. The entire trip I saw two tractors in the field, both with field cultivators. In addition I saw two terra-gators  spreading fertilizer.

Granted it was windshield observation along the interstate at 75 miles an hour. But I saw a lot of big fields that were not planted. Even at 75 miles an hour I know what a field planted to corn looks like! In addition as we drove into Illinois and then Indiana the fields were wet. Many had water standing in them. So, we in Minnesota are not alone in wishing the winter of 2018 would be over!