After the deluge: Historic floods spell trouble for farmers, rural communities and the nation

Farms under water

An excess of water on agricultural land, if it persists, can make it impossible to grow crops, Uhlir said. Soil erosion, along with high deposits of sand and other debris, damages land that was once productive. That translates to a lower crop yield for farmers and less income to pay for repairs.

Nebraska Farm Bureau President Steve Nelson estimates that the state lost $400 million in livestock and $450 million in crops. But it’s too early to know the long-term toll this year’s floods will have on the economy.

Following the Mississippi River flooding in 2008, communities in southeastern Iowa and west central Illinois collectively experienced a 35% decline in farm earnings, according to a report by the Illinois Institute for Rural Affairs. Some counties in the affected areas saw permanent job losses.

In the past 50 or 60 years, the Midwest has experienced wetter conditions, and heavier precipitation events when they occur, according to Doug Kluck, the central region climate services director of the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration.

“So it’s not surprising that we see more instances of flooding, especially with heavier rainfall,” he said.

This year’s flooding was “an outlier,” Kluck said.

“Are we going to see this every year? No. Are we going to see this more frequently? Perhaps.”

According to the National Climate Assessment, annual precipitation has increased in the Midwest, up to 20% in some locations, and the heaviest rainfall has only gotten heavier.

This trend is concerning, given how many people can be affected by flooding.

Although FEMA estimates that 13 million Americans live in a 100-year flood zone, the actual number may be much higher, according to an Environmental Research Letters study in 2018. FEMA flood maps do not take into account the risk generated by smaller streams, and the study estimates that a more accurate count is nearly 41 million.

For instance, many properties that were flooded in Nebraska in 2019 were not directly impacted by the Missouri River but by its tributaries, including Verdigre and Ponca creeks and the Niobrara River.

The Missouri River isn’t the only waterway that experienced unusual floods in 2019. The Mississippi also flooded farmland from the Midwest down to the Gulf of Mexico.

Smith Stoner, a fourth generation farmer in Holly Bluff, Mississippi, said flooding began in February and is not expected to subside until August.

He usually plants corn, cotton and soybeans on his 2,800 acres. This year, he was only able to plant cotton, and only on 800 acres. The floods, Stoner said, have “got us trapped with no way out.”

Based on his budget, the worst case scenario for 2019 is a $350,000 loss, with the best case scenario a $250,000 loss.

“We can’t survive two years of this,” he said, explaining that farmers have to pay for crop insurance, loans on equipment, land rent, labor and fuel costs regardless of whether they make a profit.

Stoner’s great-grandfather founded the farm in 1919, but Stoner is the only descendant still working family land.

“I’ve seen so many people ... lose everything their families worked for for years and years,” he said. “It’s said that the third generation, they’re the ones that lose the land. I’ve made it to the fourth generation and I’m determined to … still have that land to give hopefully to the next generation. It means more than anything in the world to me.”

But challenges from one season often carry over into the next.

Tyler Rohrer, a produce farmer in Lancaster County, Pennsylvania, is still recovering from last year’s floods.

“2018 was one of the wettest years on record,” Rohrer said. “And tomatoes do not like wet.”

He said the excessive water brought disease upon his tomato crop, lowering productivity. And the following year, he lost half of his strawberry crop due to rotten roots.

“Farming, as I like to explain it, is more of a lifestyle,” Rohrer said. “It's not a let's-get-rich-quick thing. It's a year-in and year-out, long term-commitment and you just keep going.”

‘Like the Great Depression’

Floods also devastate the small towns that support agriculture. Business owners struggled as visitors dwindled and locals had less to spend.

“It's been a real financial struggle for everyone,” said Denise Wilson, who owns a bar in the Niobrara, population 370, where the Niobrara and Missouri rivers meet.

“It’s almost like the Great Depression. People aren't moving,” she said. “They aren't going anywhere. There's no money to spend. Farming in this area is a big part of our economics. If the farmers aren't doing well, no one's doing well.”

Niobrara also relies on hunters, river rafters and visitors to Niobrara State Park to boost its economy. Wilson said her bar reflects the state of the local economy.

“Since March 15, there aren't any people in the chairs,” she said. “The business has dropped probably to at least a third, and almost a quarter of what we had any other year that we have been in operation.”

Towns by the Mississippi have seen something similar, said Stoner, the Holly Bluff farmer. The only grocery store in town recently shut down, as has a nearby tractor dealership.

“Businesses are already getting shut down just after six months of (floods),” Stoner said. “So just think about if you had a full year or another year after that … if that happens, then you would see towns dry out to nothing.”

‘This is our home’

Just east of Niobrara, on the Santee Sioux Reservation, Mike Crosley lost his home and ranch to floodwaters.

By the evening of March 13, 2 feet of water stood in Crosley’s home, and most of his outbuildings were 8 feet under. Then the power went out.

“I went to higher ground at my parents’ place,” Crosley said. “They're in their 80s and my father's on oxygen, and we began getting the generators hooked up to keep his oxygen supply working.”

For three nights, Crosley woke up every two hours to make sure his dad’s oxygen was flowing. By the time he got back to his own home, everything was “a total loss.”

“I'm 62 years old and I had never seen that amount of water ever come down that quick,” Crosley said. “It scoured the bottom of the creek 6 to 10 feet deep. It deposited sand all over our fields on over 200 acres.”

Crosley describes his heritage as “from two worlds” – white and Native American. His Santee Sioux ancestors have been in the area since the 1860s, and as the tribe’s land manager, Crosley believes it’s his responsibility to regain as much lost land as possible for the tribe.

Meanwhile, “in the white world,” Crosley said, he’s still farming the same acres that his great-grandfathers bought when they settled. His history with the land makes him committed to staying on it.

“I'm not going to leave here,” he said. “I am going to build a house in a better location. But I would never leave here.”

Things haven’t been easy, said Crosley, who still is living with his brother. “I think today's Day 94 – we count days of how long we've been homeless.”

For some, this housing insecurity lasts long after waters have receded.

Debra Grant, a member of the Omaha Tribe of Nebraska, had lived most of her life on the reservation in Macy, and spent 15 years in a three-bedroom home in “the bottom.” The bottom, named because it used to be the bottom of the Missouri River before it changed course, is fertile, grassy land with an abundance of wide-open space.

Grant did not know the area was a floodplain.

In 2011, she had to evacuate within 24 hours when the Missouri topped its banks. The farm in those lowlands took five years to recover and grow crops again. For Grant, the recovery has not ended.

She spent the next five years in a home that was not “fit to live in,” with a basement full of cat feces and mold. In December 2016, Grant, two of her children and five of her grandchildren moved into a new house. In March, her home was flooded again.

“I said I think the flood followed me up here,” Grant said.

Venetia Wolfe, deputy director of the Omaha Tribal Housing Authority, said the flooding has affected all tribe members.

“What's going to happen if the flood waters don't stop, where are we going to go, what we're going to do?” Wolfe said. “We have no place to go. This is our home.”

News21 reporters Allie Barton and Priscilla Malavet contributed to this report.

Allie Barton, Molly Duerig and Anya Magnuson are Hearst Foundation Fellows. Priscilla Malavet is a Knight Foundation Fellow.