Extreme Drought Threatens Wisconsin Corn Crop

Jul 07, 2023

By Jenny Peek

A statewide dry spell is making farmers across Wisconsin uneasy about the prospect of their crops.

As of July 4, the U.S. Drought Monitor showed much of the state is experiencing severe or moderate drought — with most of Dane County dealing with extreme drought.

Derek Orth owns Orthridge Jerseys in Fenimore. He's also on the board of Grant County's Farm Bureau.

He told Wisconsin Public Radio's "The Morning Show" his corn and alfalfa crops took longer than usual to germinate. Corn he planted on June 1 just recently broke ground.

"The corn didn't come out of the ground until this past weekend," he said. "Usually, corn in June takes five or six days to germinate, and this took 35 days. So ... it's kind of scary."

July is a key month for corn pollination, making the next few weeks all the more critical for the crop.

That's according to Jason Otkin, an associate research professor at the University of Wisconsin-Madison who specializes in drought.

"We're entering a really important time of the year now for the corn crop — pollination in July is so critical. So if we stay dry, and if we get really unlucky and have a big heat wave, that's going to do quite the number on the corn crop," he told "The Morning Show."

Kevin Krentz, president of the Wisconsin Farm Bureau Federation and a dairy farmer in Berlin, said current conditions are leading to a lot of stress among the ag industry.

"Farmers have put a lot of their time, a lot of dollars, and a lot of work into these crops just to watch them slowly fade away and not be able to do anything but hope and pray for rain," Krentz told "The Morning Show."

He mentioned today's crops are more drought-resistant than those used 30 or more years ago. No till practices and cover crops have also helped with extreme conditions.

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Video: Spring 2026 weather outlook for Wisconsin; What an early-arriving El Niño could mean

Northeast Wisconsin is a small corner of the world, but our weather is still affected by what happens across the globe.

That includes in the equatorial Pacific, where changes between El Niño and La Niña play a role in the weather here -- and boy, have there been some abrupt changes as of late.

El Niño and La Niña are the two phases of what is collectively known as the El Niño Southern Oscillation, or ENSO for short. These are the swings back and forth from unusually warm to unusually cold sea surface temperatures in the Pacific Ocean along the equator.

Since this past September, we have been in a weak La Niña, which means water temperatures near the Eastern Pacific equator have been cooler than usual. That's where we're at right now.

Even last fall, the long-term outlook suggested a return to neutral conditions by spring and potentially El Niño conditions by summer.

But there are some signs this may be happening faster than usual, which could accelerate the onset of El Niño.

Over the last few weeks, unusually strong bursts of westerly winds farther west in the Pacific -- where sea surface temperatures are warmer than average -- have been observed. There is a chance that this could accelerate the warming of those eastern Pacific waters and potentially push us into El Niño sooner than usual.

If we do enter El Nino by spring -- which we'll define as the period of March, April and May -- there are some long-term correlations with our weather here in Northeast Wisconsin.

Looking at a map of anomalously warm weather, most of the upper Great Lakes doesn't show a strong correlation, but in general, the northern tiers of the United States do tend to lean to that direction.

The stronger correlation is with precipitation. El Niño conditions in spring have historically come with a higher risk of very dry weather over that time frame, so this will definitely be a transition we'll have to watch closely as we move out of winter.