BRR! It Was 28 Degrees Saturday Morning In Faribault!

Saturday morning Louise had to go to work so we both got up at our normal time of 3:15. The first thing I did was check the weather on my cell phone. Yikes, it was 28 degrees in Faribault! I knew it would likely get a couple degrees colder by sunrise almost 3 hours later. The freeze damage to crops is not just about how far below 32 degrees but also the duration or how long it is below freezing. Saturday morning it was many hours below freezing.

When I got to the farm Saturday morning I walked into a corn field and did not see any frost damage yet. Normally by late morning or around noon after a frost the leaves will get a dark green or almost black as the plant tissue decays. About 4:30 Saturday afternoon I took this picture of what appears to be normal corn plants that just emerged! It appeared that neighbors corn fields that were planted a few days before mine looked okay too!

We do have a couple more cold mornings in the forecast and maybe frost damage will still show up. However, at this point it sure did not look as bad as I expected. Plus, even if the leaves above ground froze off the growing point is well below ground so the corn should grow back!

 
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