Seeding here in the Southeast is approximately 25 percent complete with some smaller areas being a few percent higher.  

That is according to Brian Dueck from Seine River Seed Farm. He notes seeding really got underway last week and from what he's heard, farmers are reporting a strong start. 

“They're very optimistic, we're still getting it in early enough. For a while there, it seemed like it might be a little later, but so far, it's worked out quite well. On an average year, we probably would have started five days earlier, but it's still very timely." 

Until the rain hit Tuesday morning, Dueck says the weather was very cooperative. 

“It's been working out. I know the forecast for this week has a few showers in it, but if we can escape a few of those then seeding will progress very quickly here.” 

As far as crops go, Dueck says farmers are planting slightly more corn and cereals than usual, but overall, it's a fairly average year. 

Unfortunately, Dueck says some crops need re-seeding. 

“The alfalfa and the fall seeded crops had quite a bit of winter kill, I would say maybe 50% of them got written off, but there is not a whole lot of winter wheat in the area like there used to be. The biggest thing is the alfalfa, some of the big dairies have been relying on that and when it kills off their whole crop, that's going to make it difficult for them.” 

Dueck says many dairy farmers have had to turn to forage oats or forage barley to compensate while they re-plant their alfalfa fields.