This week’s winter wallop across the U.S. means different things to farmers in different places. In Kansas, the biggest blizzard in more than a century had livestock producers scrambling to safeguard their herds. In Iowa and parts of Minnesota, farmers were relieved for a real cold snap that goes deeper in the soil to help kill future pests. Further north in the Midwest, though, growers of winter crops like alfalfa worry that a lack of adequate snow cover leaves their plants vulnerable to cold and ice.
