Hail Devastates Waverly Farms
MINNEAPOLIS (WCCO) -- Severe storms rolled through parts of the state Wednesday morning. The worst weather hit Wright County, with damaging winds and large hail.
For farmers there, the storm was devastating. Piles of hail up to a foot deep is an incredible sight to a meteorologist, but it's a sight that farmers in Waverly, Minn. hope to never see, especially at harvest time.
"It's a major, major blow for us," said Paul Nelson of Untiedt's Farms. "That's a major revenue source for the fall. You know, we're winding down with all our summer crops, and we count on our apples and our pumpkins in the fall to get us through."
From squash, to beans, to corn -- all types of crops in the path of this storm were severely impacted. Nelson says the Untiedt's apple crop was destroyed.
"We were just getting ready to pick sweet tangos, and we just got done picking zest stars, but everything else is gone," he said.
The pumpkins can be salvaged, but no prize winners will grow from the patch. The force of the hail severed their vines.
A day that could have been spent harvesting the yield is spent assessing the damage. Insurance adjusters arrived at the farm just hours after the storm.
"Right around here, this is as bad as we've seen it," Nelson said.
Hail stones were reported to be as large as half dollars.