How Illinois soybean farmers deal with the effects of climate change

WATERMAN, Ill. (CBS) – Illinois is the top grower of soybeans in the U.S., most of which is used to feed the chicken and beef eaten by consumers, but climate change is affecting local farmers and may end up affecting what shoppers pay at the store.

About an hour west of Chicago, the pace is a little slower in DeKalb County, where Ryan Frieders, a seventh-generation farmer, and his family grow crops on about 2,400 acres, an area about 10 times the size of Millennium Park.

"We have some of the best soils in the world," Frieders said.

And no one watches the weather more closely than a farmer.

"Honestly, I think I have five different weather apps on my phone, and I probably check them over a dozen times a day," he said.

The land has been in the Frieders' family for 60 years, and Ryan's father, Ronald, lives just a few miles down the road.

"I graduated in 1970 and basically walked out of high school and started farming with my folks," said Ronald Frieders.

The elder Frieders said that weather has "always been a challenge," but it seems that challenge is getting more extreme.

"Everything's changing it seems like, the temperatures are getting hotter than normal, the water levels are lower than normal," Ronald said.

Ryan added they're faced with longer periods of a lack of rain, or what might be called a "flash drought." Sometimes, they're faced with more rain than usual, which could delay the planting of their crops.

"It affects our entire year of the farm," Ryan said.

The changes are all consistent with the Fifth National Climate Assessment's expectations for Midwest agriculture in a warming world, which include:

• "Excessive spring rain delaying planting."
• "Rapid transitions between flood and drought."
• "Warmer temperatures stressing crops."

Ronald said 2021 was the most difficult harvest that he's ever experienced.

"Our crops were flattened," he said.

That came about due to worsening thunderstorm wind damage, which is also linked to climate change in a new study. Ryan said the changes in weather patterns and their effect on crops also has an affect on the farm's income.

Michael Langemeier, a professor of agriculture economics at Purdue University, said the weather changes are something farmers are discussing more and more.

"I don't know if it's directly impacting what the consumers pay to a large degree, yet," Langemeier said.

He and his team have surveyed 400 farmers nationwide. He asked farmers about how worried they were about the changing weather patterns, and about 25% said they were either "very worried" or "fairly worried."

"I thought that was a relatively high percent," Langemeier said.

He added the farmers didn't talk much about what those changes might be attributed to, "They just talk about it as different, and we've got to think about how we're going to respond to these changes."

Ryan said it might be difficult to understand how glaciers melting at the earth's poles affect their farm, "but then you see things happening that aren't the same as they used to be, and you tend to wonder if the things are more related than you ever thought they were."

The Frieders farm installed solar panels to lower their carbon footprint and has made changes to their operation in response to the changes in the weather.

Data from the Illinois Soybean Association show that crop yield has not changed significantly over the last decade.