Flooding of US Plains helps boost farmers' income

Chicago

FARMERS are reaping higher yields and ranchers' feed costs have fallen sharply since flooding swept across the southern US Plains in May, with the record rains providing tangible benefits to agriculture despite causing damage that will likely cost billions of dollars to repair.

The storms inundated fields across Texas and Oklahoma but they broke a years-long drought that wreaked havoc on the profitability of growers and cattlemen.

Even though floods tend to grab more headlines, drought is actually much more costly in terms of its impact on agriculture. "The thing that differentiates it (drought) from all other natural hazards is the fact that it covers such a wide swath or spatial extent," said Don Willhite, climatologist in the School of Natural Resources at University of Nebraska-Lincoln. "Floods are much more localised. (Drought…