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Prevent plant claims likely in soaked southeastern Illinois

A technical services representative with BASF says some southeastern Illinois farmers have struggled to find windows to plant this year. 

Mike Probst, who’s based in Effingham County, says his area has been inundated with heavy rains throughout the spring.

“Weather event after weather event of two to three inches of rain really made it tough on folks in that area.”  He says, “I think there’s fields that have probably been replanted 3 times. I know a lot of the corn that went in at the end of April, most of that didn’t make it or wasn’t a quality enough stand, so it got worked up.”

He tells Brownfield it’s causing farmers to adjust plans on the fly and to consider prevented plant insurance claims.

“We’ve already had several questions where folks have asked if they can come back and plant soybeans based off of what they’ve applied on their corn crop that year, especially in river bottom ground that’s been flooded multiple times.”  He says, “But yeah, I know for a fact that’s going to impact a good number of growers.”

Probst says the disjointed planting season has led to crops in varying stages of development, which could pose management challenges for producers throughout the rest of the growing season.

“Maybe the yield potential is not there, but we have actually seen in some of our data, some of that later planted corn is actually where we see some of our biggest fungicide responses.”  He says, “It actually goes through more of its life cycle where it is combating disease if that disease does show up early like this year.”

He says the crops in the area that were planted timely and have withstood the storms are doing well and have benefited from the rains.

AUDIO: Mike Probst – BASF

INDIANA (WPTA) – The Indiana Bureau of Motor Vehicles and Indiana State Police are addressing online rumors about the BMV’s new license plate design.

The BMV says that when they post about the Blackout plates on their social media accounts, they receive comments claiming the design makes it easier for plate recognition cameras, like Flock, to read.

WATCH: Fort Wayne Flock camera showdown reflects nationwide debate | Story continues below