'If rains come, corn won't respond'

GRAND RAPIDS, Mich. (WOOD) - Ottawa County farmer Marlin Langeland sees one of two things happening because of this drought: higher food prices or farmers taking big hits.

Corn is in 75% of everything sold in the market, from taco shells to soda pop. Langeland's corn stays right on his 2700-acre family farm for his dairy cows, beef cattle and chickens.

But his corn is in trouble. Where irrigation reaches his field, the corn stands up to 8 or 9 feet tall, but that irrigation doesn't cover much, and most of the corn looks shriveled.

"As early as we planted and with the heat, it should be twice as high as this," he told 24 Hour News 8. "It's dying. Not just rolled up like a pine cone, but actually turning brown. If rains come it ain't going to respond to it."

The drought will likely force him to buy corn from elsewhere, which will raise his prices -- and raise the price of milk, beef and eggs.

"If it was just Ottawa County or just the state of Michigan, but this is nationwide. There's a lot of concern out there."

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The drought gripping the United States is the widest since 1956, according to new data released Monday by the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration.

Fifty-five percent of the continental U.S. was in a moderate to extreme drought by the end of June, NOAA's National Climactic Data Center in Asheville, N.C., said in its monthly State of the Climate drought report. That's the largest percentage since December 1956, when 58% of the country was covered by drought.

This summer, 80% of the U.S. is abnormally dry, and the report said the drought expanded in the West, Great Plains and Midwest last month with the 14th warmest and 10th driest June on record.

The report is based on a data set going back to 1895 called the Palmer Drought Index.

Information from The Associated Press

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The last time the Langeland Farm saw rain was four weeks ago. "We had an inch, and that's the last we've seen," he said. The field out back is showing deep cracks in the soil. "That's going to take a lot of water to fill a crack like that."

The Langeland family has owned this Coopersville farm since 1929. Marlin's father, Lester, remembers the droughts of 1936 and 1988. The 1936 drought was the worst for the farm, but this is getting bad, Lester Langeland said.

"They're all devastating. There's nothing rosy about a drought situation."

Marlin Langeland prays for rain and "patience." The Langelands aren't the only farmers praying for an end to the drought. Last week, 75-100 farmers and their families gathered at Rusk Christian Reformed Church near Allendale for a rain prayer service.

"I guess that's another sign of how severe it's getting. It's getting desperate."