VIDALIA — It’s been a hard, hard year for Concordia Parish’s farmers.

That’s the phrase Concordia Parish Extension Service Director Glen Daniels keeps repeating while out in the fields.

The summer harvest is under way, and the amounts of different crops harvested are down — sometimes way down — across the board, Daniels said.

“It has been a long year, and it has been tough,” he said.

“At the end of May, the rain shut off, and there were areas that went four to six weeks with no rain,” he said.

That early lack of rain, which ended in July, has continued to plague crop producers.

“Where we didn’t get rain and didn’t irrigate, yield is going to fall off tremendously,” he said.

In some areas, soybean yield has been as low as five or six bushels an acre, with the highest yield he’s heard this year being in the upper 30s, Daniels said.

A normal soybean output is around 50 bushels an acre, he said.

In addition to the hot weather, a stinkbug problem contributed to the soybean decline, Daniels said.

Perhaps the most visible reminder of the summer’s dry period were the acres of brown, dried corn stalks that until recently stood in the fields, and Daniels said those reminders didn’t lie.

Corn yield is around 50 to 60 bushels an acre, he said.

For the same period in 2008, the estimated corn yield was 159.5 bushels per acre.

Cotton is suffering as well, and Daniels said he would guess yield would only be 800-1,000 pounds per acre on fertile ground and 600-700 pounds on heavier clay soil.

“This year, we have small, little cotton bolls that are short and tight,” he said.

There are some bright spots, however.

Grain sorghum is doing better, yielding between 70-75 bushels an acre and 90 bushels in a good spot, Daniels said.

Likewise, the rice harvest will actually be up, between 150 and 180 bushels an acre, Daniels said.

That’s because rice doesn’t have to deal with a lot of disease pressure during a dry year, he said.

But that gain cost other crops dearly.

“I am glad this year is over,” Daniels said.