When to harvest is one of the most crucial decisions a winemaker can make. Too early, and the result is bitter. Too late, and it’s overly sweet. It’s a delicate balance—one that’s increasingly being upended by the climate crisis. In …
Two Kentucky farmers and a relative have been indicted for falsifying crop damage and exaggerating the size of their fields in order to reap crop insurance benefits. A federal grand jury last week charged Randall Taulbee and James McDonald, of …
Insurance payments to U.S. farmers for crops lost to droughts and flooding have risen more than threefold over the past 25 years, according to an analysis of federal data by the Environmental Working Group (EWG) released on Thursday. The report …
Responding to extreme drought conditions in parts of the country, the U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) is authorizing emergency procedures to help agricultural producers. USDA’s Risk Management Agency (RMA) is working with crop insurance companies to streamline and accelerate the …
Recent wildfires in California Wine Country, particularly those that devastated parts of Napa and Sonoma counties in October 2017, have focused attention on whether insurance covers smoke taint damage to grapes and wine. Many wineries and grape growers have notified …
LEXINGTON, Ky. — Another Central Kentucky farmer has pleaded guilty in a crop insurance fraud scheme that a federal prosecutor has called “pervasive and severe” in that region. Daniel Arvin pleaded guilty on Dec. 19 in federal court in Lexington …
For months, traders debated which crops U.S. farmers would sow this year. That discussion is now turning to how many acres may be left unplanted as relentless rainfall sweeps the Midwest. Rabobank is predicting an unprecedented number of unplanted acres …
Kansas farmer Mark Nelson had until Saturday to plant his corn or lose the insurance that protects him from a drop in prices or yield. Instead, he’s hopping on a plane to visit his father in Chicago. Nelson is now …
MALVERN, Iowa — The Black Hawk military helicopter flew over Iowa, giving a senior U.S. agriculture official and U.S. senator an eyeful of the flood damage below, where yellow corn from ruptured metal silos spilled out into the muddy water. …
CHICAGO/COLUMBUS, Neb. — At least 1 million acres of U.S. farmland were flooded after the “bomb cyclone” storm left wide swaths of nine major grain producing states under water this month, satellite data analyzed by Gro Intelligence for Reuters showed. …