Weather and Market Commentary: November 16, 2009

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Weather and Market Commentary: November 16, 2009

November 16, 2009 by sabrina829

Monday, November 16, 2009:

Two solid weeks of close-to-perfect harvesting weather came to an end late in this past weekend, with substantial amounts of rain (and some snow) for the central and southern Plains, the far western Delta, and in the Corn Belt for especially Missouri, central Illinois, northern Indiana, and far southern Michigan. Radar is suggesting a lot of 0.50 to 1.00 inch totals in the Corn Belt, and through midnight I can confirm those totals for places like Columbia, St. Louis, Springfield, and Peoria. This system is associated with a closed low-pressure system aloft; they are typically slow to move and this one is no different. The heaviest of the precipitation from the system will be over the next 48 hours, but it will not be until Friday before that system pulls far enough to the northeast to cease its impact on Midwest weather. Thus, we still have substantial amounts of precipitation to work through in the near term for a sizable part of the Nation’s midsection. Another 1.00 to 2.50 inches is forecast from now through early Thursday for southeastern Iowa, northeastern Missouri, and much of Illinois and Indiana. Because of those rains (and because river levels are already high), flood watches have been posted for far southeastern Iowa, eastern Missouri, and far western Illinois. There is not much cold air associated with this system, but what there is currently is found in the southwestern Corn Belt (right underneath the upper level low) and in that area there is snow falling early on this Monday.

Winter weather advisories and even winter storm warnings are posted for northeastern Kansas, far northwestern Missouri, far southwestern Iowa, and far southeastern Nebraska where one to as much as five inches of snow is expected for today. As you can surmise in the above wording, not “everyone” is going to see precipitation from this storm. Very little in the way of precipitation is forecast throughout this work-week for northwestern Iowa, Minnesota, and the Dakotas; open harvest weather is thus going to continue for those areas. Not much in the way of precipitation may fall for Friday or Saturday, but we are looking at a pretty sizable storm for Sunday/Monday of next week. Temperatures still look abnormally warm over the next week, and that is especially the case for areas north of Interstate 80 where readings will average 5-10 degrees above normal. Colder weather is forecast for the second week of the two-week outlook, especially for the southeastern half of the Nation (the Dakotas in particular will still average a bit above normal on temperatures for that period). For this afternoon’s harvest progress report, I would look for the national soybean harvest to be 90 percent complete, with the corn harvest at 52 percent done.