Extremely variable weather has caused stress on crops as well as farmers in the Charleston area this year.

Although the crop season started out smoothly in April, the dryness of the summer has had an impact on the amount harvested and how much revenue farmers will receive.

The good weather in early April allowed some farmers to plant early while the rain and cold throughout May forced others to wait an extra month to plant their crop, said Dennis Bowman, crop systems educator at the University of Illinois, Urbana/Champaign.

“The crops that got planted early were put through a lot of stressful weather,” Bowman said.

The weather continued to be unpredictable throughout the summer with heavy rain at the beginning of June and then almost no rain until early September.

“The drought allowed fungus to grow in the corn,” said Mark Phelan, Coles County Farm Bureau manager.

Bowman said during a period of drought, the corn sticks out of the husk. This allows disease and moisture into the ear and causes ear rot, or mold on the ear.

“The elevators must check the corn when it comes in,” Bowman said. “If there is too much mold on it, then it will not be allowed to be stored there.”

This, he said, is what can cause problems for most farmers.

“When the elevators turn farmers away, they have to find somewhere else to store their corn, that means they have to pay to have it stored elsewhere,” Phelan said.

Furthermore, farmers have to find a secondary market for their corn, such as using it for feed or gasoline because it is unsuitable for use as food. This means they may have to pay to have it shipped elsewhere in order for it to be used.

These added expenses could be a problem for farmers this year.

“A lot of farmers have been getting government support, but with prices (for crops) being better than they have been, they will receive less government support even if they have a lower yield,” Bowman said. “This means that they won’t have as good of an income as in normal years.”

However, that may not affect the economy right away.

Phelan said farmers make up only two percent of the U.S. population, so it will take a while for the problems to impact the general economy.

“It starts with the farmers and then trickles down slowly,” Phelan said.

Although yield will be down for many area farmers, there are also those farmers that will get to see an average yield because of the spottiness of the rain.

“One field might be average and the one next to it will only have half of the normal yield,” Phelan said. “You just have to be lucky about where the rain fell.”