It's going to be a hectic season ahead for farmers in the southeast as they lay waiting for the ground to thaw out and dry up enough to pull the seeders into the field. A long, cold winter that didn't see a lot of snow could make things difficult for a lot of crops to get out of the ground.

"Thank goodness we had that one big snow storm in March to get a little bit of snow," says Edgar Hammermeister, who farms in the Frobisher/Alameda area." That'll give us a little bit of recharge here, but there's not much water out and about right now."

As you could expect, that lack of water in the soil means it could be a more frantic than usual dash to get the crop in quicker during the already hectic season.

"Once we get the soil a little bit warmer, guys are going to be going pretty hard, pretty quick to take advantage of that little bit of moisture we do have."

With possible temperatures creeping up to 28 degrees by the weekend, farmers could be pulling into the field as early as the weekend.

"The soil will be on the cool side but there's things that we can do to protect it from the cold. The cold causes things to germinate slower and there's risk of disease."

Hammermeister would continue on to talk about how increasing the amount of phosphate the farmers are using could potentially help protect the seed in the ground before it starts to grow out of the soil.

Another issue that producers in the area could be facing has to do with a crop that's already in the ground: winter wheat.

"I do have some concerns about my wheat and my variety according to the model, but locally I may have had just enough snow to protect it this winter."

Hammermeister is optimistic when it comes to the fall planted crop, but it's still a little too early to tell.

"There's more green out there than I was expecting, but after this week I'll have a better idea if I have to terminate or if I can continue to let it grow."

In the event that the winter wheat crop will not be able to survive into the growing season, the crop will be killed off and seeded over with another type of cereal crop that will be harvested in the fall along with the rest of this year's crop.