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Miller: Extent of Indiana farm loss unbelievable

By ANN HINCH
Assistant Editor

WEST TERRE HAUTE, Ind. — Last fall’s cornstalks, left in fields several blocks away to decay into the soil, littered the yard of a small West Terre Haute rental house belonging to Mark Phillips last week, the house leaning a bit as he and an employee tried to pump out stormwater from the flood the previous weekend.
“My grandparents had this for 68 years, and nothing like this ever happened,” Phillips said.
He blames the altered drainage pattern of the area, created by extensive work on Highway 63 in the past few years. Joan Pullman, who co-owns the Joan & Yogi’s 1 Stop deli next door, said this is the opinion of many people – a lot of whom packed into her small store to wait for assistance during the flood, as waters invaded their homes.
Ben Cottrell, a local firefighter and small business owner, was one of the rescue teams hauling people to higher ground in trucks and boats. He also helps his father-in-law, Bob Caton, farm about 2,600 acres of row crops – much of which was underwater for several days after the June 6-7 rains.
“I think it’s safe to say in the affected counties, you’re going to see 20 to 30 percent loss of farmland,” said Indiana Agriculture Director Andy Miller, late last week. “It’s just unbelievable, the extent of what we’re dealing with.”
He had just finished touring the hardest-hit counties with Gov. Mitch Daniels. Farmers are used to disasters being part of the hazards of their profession, he pointed out, but to lose so much – equipment, crops, homes, livestock – to one event is extraordinary.
“We know how to farm in the river bottom, but this is beyond anything we can imagine,” Miller said, adding at press time there were no reportable numbers of losses. He did know of some large farm owners reporting half or more – sometimes, all – of their crop being underwater.
One of Caton’s winter wheat fields – which should have been fully golden, nearly ready for harvest – was instead patterned in stripes of gold; a dull, dead brown; and murky-colored standing water.
Cottrell’s wife, Ashlee, said they were finished planting what corn they could get into the ground, what with all the rain this spring preventing even more seed being set. Her father estimated losses of 300 acres of corn that can’t be replanted at this late date, one-quarter of his crop; 300 acres of soybeans, or a third of the crop; as well as 100 acres of milo and 200 acres – or two-thirds – of the wheat crop.
“I don’t think we even know yet,” Ashlee said of the full extent of damage, as of June 14.
She said what young corn may be salvaged will go into milo and beans can be replanted until about mid-July if the ground and weather allows. But much of Caton’s river bottom land, she added, may not be replantable this year.
Caton estimated crop losses alone at just under $1 million, she said. But that’s just part of what he planted – Ashlee, who works at Terre Haute Grain, said she’s heard from many area farmers whose entire fields were stuck underwater for days, depriving their plants of necessary oxygen.
To the east, in Morgan County, James Lankford has tallied a preliminary estimate of approximately $1 million in lost crops, fences, livestock (11 calves and two cows) and land that may not be used for planting this year. As of June 15, he hadn’t been able to measure lost crops, but is confident at least half of the 1,150 acres of corn and 900 of soybeans are ruined, as well as some of the 40 acres of winter wheat nearly ready for harvest.
“We probably had flood water over, I’m going to guess, probably 1,700 acres, and we’re still assessing damage,” he said, adding he, his wife, Ann, and his stepson, Mike Case, farm 2,300 acres, 40 percent of which the Lankfords own. They also have more than 250 head of beef cattle.
His farm in Jefferson Township is one of those Miller and Daniels toured last week. It is located half a mile from the White River, with a railroad and Highway 67 between the two. When he got up at 6:15 the morning of June 7, a creek on the property was full in its banks, but since he’d never seen it flood in his 62 years on the century-old family farm, he wasn’t prepared for the deluge as it overran those banks within the next half-hour.
“So, we basically had no time to react,” Lankford said, adding the waters rose to over two feet on the property.
The flooding took out fences in all four of his pastures and left more debris than just silt or tree branches – so far, he’s seen a picnic table in his field, as well as tires, logs and even a refrigerator. This is a problem on farms in many counties, Miller agreed, calling the extensive debris the “800-pound gorilla” that will be difficult to move in time to replant everything this season.
By this time of year, Lankford said his area has had about 20 inches of rain – which is what he estimates Morgan County has received in the last two weeks alone. The southern half of the county sustained more damage than the northern, he thinks, because of the river.
As for other losses, he said water crept into the garage and shop and ruined some items on the floor, but most can be rescued by drying them out. Some equipment wheel bearings will have to be repacked, but at least he didn’t have any grain silos flooded – something his neighbors can’t say.
“I know there’s a lot of people that need some help,” he said. “However bad we think we have it, somebody else has it worse. It may take us a little while, but we will recoup and recover; that’s what farmers do.”

6/18/2008