Area farmers are assessing the damage after severe weather plowed through the South Plains Tuesday night.

“It always takes the wind out of your sail of course,” said Keith Layton, a farmer in Lamb County.

Layton farms cotton, corn, and wheat near Sudan, Texas. An area hit hard by rain, hail, and high winds.

“Yesterday cotton was beautiful, everything was going well and then that afternoon after about four, hailstorms. Well, we end up with what you’re seeing right now,” Layton said.

Layton tells KCBD that at least eight of his crop circles have been hailed out, but it’s not just his fields that suffered damage.

“Lots of my neighbors, especially in the Bula area here, it’s really bad,” Layton said.

In his 40 years of experience, Layton says he’s grown accustomed to the weather here, but there’s never a right time for a hailstorm.

“A lot of times they come right at the wrong time, like maybe closer to harvest time. I’ve been hailed out before in October, it’s just hard to take that,” Layton said.

Right now, it’s unclear how much of his cotton will make it through. However, there is still time to plant some more.

“Chances are we’ll probably have to fight the sand to begin with to keep the land from blowing away and then after that, put the planter back in here and start planting again,” Layton said.

It’s a different story for his wheat crops, which also suffered damage. That’s because wheat is typically harvested in late June or early July.

“The wheat is probably going to have to have an insurance adjuster to that, because of the loss there,” Layton said.

Despite all this, Layton believes that he and other farmers will be able to pull through.

However, he says congress needs to act fast in order for them to get the help that they need.

“People that drive down on the highway, they think farming is a really easy thing, but it is not. It is tough and the conditions that we are going through right now with the farm bill, we are needing that legislation to be done soon,” Layton said.

Through the farm bill, the Federal Crop Insurance Program offers subsidized crop insurance to protect farmers against poor harvests due to natural causes.

Under the U.S. House’s farm bill proposal that insurance would be strengthened, however it does not have support of Senate democrats or the White House.

Source - https://www.kcbd.com