Aug 26 (Reuters) – Hot temperatures this week and dry conditions over much of the U.S. Midwest for the next two weeks are likely to stress developing corn and soybean crops, an agricultural meteorologist said on Monday.
Corn futures on the Chicago Board of Trade hit a one-month high on Monday, and new-crop November soybeans traded at their highest level in nearly a year on concerns that the hot and dry weather would stress crops and reduce yields.
Rains early this week will favor northern Minnesota and northern Wisconsin, shifting eastward to Michigan and northern Ohio by the middle of the week, said meteorologist Don Keeney of MDA Weather Services.
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The showers should bring 0.25 inch (0.64 cm) of rain by Friday to far northern Illinois, northern Indiana and Ohio, with parts of eastern Ohio receiving up to 0.5 inch.
Another storm system is expected across northern Minnesota and Wisconsin late Thursday and early Friday. Those areas may receive about an inch of rain.
However, Keeney said, core crop areas of the central and western Midwest will remain dry.
“Almost all of Iowa, the southern two-thirds of Illinois, Missouri and the southern half of Indiana are completely dry this week and very warm early this week,” Keeney said.
“Looking beyond that, I don’t see much relief for them for the next 15 days.”
Temperatures this week are expected to peak in the 90s F (32 to 37 C), with St. Louis reaching 99 F on Wednesday. Highs in that area will say in the 90s through next weekend.
Highs in northern areas of the Midwest, including Chicago, should reach the 90s early this week but cool into the upper 80s by week’s end, Keeney said.
Over the weekend, scattered storms were limited to parts of northwestern Iowa and neighboring sections of South Dakota and Nebraska as well as west-central Wisconsin, North Dakota and parts of the Deep South, the Commodity Weather Group said in a daily note to clients
