Page 6 October 27, 2015
2015 Logan County Farm Outlook Magazine
LINCOLN DAILY NEWS.COM
Weather kicked Logan County
agriculture twice in 2015
Continued
2
015 was an interesting year for central Illinois weather. This part of the
country, and the farmers that grow crops here, were hit by two weather-related
phenomena. The early part of the summer brought a great deal of rain, and
the later part of the season came with dryer conditions. As we move on into the fall
season and the harvest is well under way, now is a good time to review the weather
for this year’s growing season.
June
The weather during month of June already
made farmers nervous because it was a much
wetter month than usual. According to weather
statistics, the average rainfall in the area (using
the city of Lincoln for the purposes of gathering
data) in the month of June is just under four-and-
a-half inches. June of 2014 was a particularly
wet June with a precipitation total of a little
under six-and-a-half inches, with 7th of June
bringing the biggest one-time rain at one-and-a-
half inches.
It is easy to imagine that farmers in Logan
County remembering the prior year would
brace themselves for the possibility that it could
happen again. Prior to June 21st of 2015, the
first day of summer, rainfall levels were still
lower than average, and it seemed like the
current year would be chalked up to random
chance.
Then, the last ten days of June brought five-
and-a-half inches of rain with them. The total
amount of rainfall in June measured at over
nine-and-three-quarters inches of precipitation.
The wettest day was the 28th, when two inches
of rain fell. Areas north of Lincoln, particularly
along Route 136 from east to west experienced
a couple record breaking single event rains that
came relatively close together.
On June 25th the Emergency Management
Agency opened its Emergency Operations
Center and called a news conference.
Responders had already made more than a
dozen water rescues, many field to field flood
related, and with more rain in the forecast were
put on high alert as area creeks and waterways
were reaching record flood stages.
