The heavy rain and flood watches that have hit several Midwestern states in recent weeks should ease just as harvest gets going, and a strengthening El Niño points to a drier, warmer autumn for much of the Corn Belt, forecasters told Successful Farming.

"In the coming weeks, there may still be one heavy rain event here or there, but it shouldn't be as prolonged as what we've seen recently," said Jim Lee, a National Weather Service meteorologist, who described the recent rainfall as not sustainable.

The Climate Prediction Center is forecasting a "very strong" El Niño this autumn and winter. The Weather Service's extended three-month outlook reflects the classic El Niño pattern: a likelihood of warmer than normal temperatures across much of the northern US and the Midwest, and a wetter south with average temperatures. Warmer weather could dry fields faster after rain and increase the number of days suitable for fieldwork in October, November and December.

Lee cautioned against reading single events as El Niño. "El Niño basically shifts the probabilities of things happening over the long term," he said, describing it as a matter of hundreds of miles and weeks or months of average weather.

AccuWeather meteorologist Tyler Roys expects El Niño's effects in the US to peak in November, December or possibly early January and to weaken in spring 2027. He said the move into winter is likely to be slow, particularly in the eastern Corn Belt. "It's very much looking like the farmers won't have to race to get crops harvested to beat that winter's coming early," he said. The story was written by Sydney Schilling.

Source: Successful Farming