Crops keep shrinking in historic drought.
CHICAGO (Reuters) - Dry and hot weather in the U.S. Midwest for the next week or two will further erode crop conditions, trimming this year's corn and soybean crop production, an agricultural meteorologist forecast Monday.
"It looks like a continued trend of below-average precipitation in the Midwest for the next week to 10 days," said John Dee, meteorologist for Global Weather Monitoring.
Temperatures this week will warm into the upper 80s to low 90s degrees Fahrenheit, with only a few light showers in the east on Monday and some rainfall later in the week, he said.
"There are no widespread soaking rains in sight. Thursday and Friday there could be scattered showers, and by the weekend from 0.30 to 0.80 inch with coverage of about 75 to 80 percent," Dee said. "There won't be as much stress as recently, but crops will continue to deteriorate."
There were mixed signals for the weather early next week, with some weather models showing some rain but others indicating that the dryness would continue.
Rains brought some relief from drought in the northern and eastern Midwest, but overall crops will continue to suffer from the worst drought in more than 50 years, especially in the central and southern Corn Belt.
http://news.yahoo.com/crops-keep-shrinking-historic-drought-122910623.html
