Farmers across a good section of the state are now playing the waiting game -- seeing just how much damage their crops took in Tuesday’s storm.

Mike Nohavec raises corn on a 1,000-acre farm near Dorchester.

“Almost every acre got hit with hail,” he said. “It was like someone hitting the side of the house with a sledge hammer.”

Nohavec has to wait five days after the storm for insurance companies to determine if a field is a total loss or if enough plants can survive to salvage a crop.

“Ultimately it's up to the insurance companies to tell us what to do,” he said.

But Nohavec isn't alone. In nearby Saline County, University of Nebraska at Lincoln extension specialist Randy Pryor is helping another farmer take a preliminary count of how one of his fields stands.

“The magnitude of this storm is what makes it unique, with the extent of the hail damage throughout the area,” Pryor said.

If the entire field is totaled, then farmers would have to decide if it's too late to get a new crop planted, one that would not be insured.

“We're basically looking at harvest on that corn in late November to early December for maturity reasons,” Nohavec said.

The next few days could have a big impact, not only on how well Nohavec will fare this year but a number of other producers, too.

“The sun is going to come up tomorrow and we'll just have to wait and see,” he said.

About 90 percent of producers in Nebraska do have some sort of crop insurance.

Source - http://www.ketv.com/