Keith Beavers examines his damaged tobacco crop on his farm in Mount Olive, N.C. When it comes to natural disasters, this has been a ìmonsterî year for farmers, one agriculture official said. An Associated Press review of disaster loans issued nationwide found the Farm Service Agency made fewer than 300, totaling just $32.6 million, for the fiscal year ending Sept. 30. To put that in perspective, Texas alone is estimated to have $1.5 billion in drought losses this year.

WICHITA, Kan. — Extreme drought withered grain across the Great Plains. Flooding from the Mississippi and Missouri rivers drowned corn and other crops from Nebraska to Louisiana. A tropical storm on the East Coast submerged Carolina tobacco fields and New Jersey blueberry bushes.

When it comes to natural disasters, this has been a “monster” year for farmers, one official said.

Yet few farmers are taking advantage of a federal loan program aimed at helping them recover. Only six states have fewer than three-fourths of their counties covered by some type of disaster declaration. In nearly half of the states, every county has been officially designated a disaster area. That means thousands of farms could apply for emergency loans.

But an Associated Press review of disaster loans issued nationwide found the Farm Service Agency made fewer than 300, totaling just $32.6 million, for the fiscal year ending Sept. 30. To put that in perspective, Texas alone is estimated to have $1.5 billion in drought losses this year.

Vance Ehmke, who farms near Healy in west-central Kansas, said many farmers haven’t applied for loans because they don’t need them. Many have money saved after several years of high grain prices. And with the drought in the South creating a hay shortage, some corn and soybean farmers have been able to bale their failed crops to sell as livestock feed.

Farmers in a belt from Texas to North Dakota also tend to have crop insurance, which Ehmke characterized as “real generous.” The federal government subsidizes farmers’ premiums, and crop insurance is available throughout the nation, although farmers in other regions tend to use it less.

“Crop insurance is a valuable program. That is one thing — with all this budget cutting that is going on — that we want to make sure we keep because it would be pretty difficult to farm in America without some kind of risk management program underneath you,” said Steve Baccus, president of the Kansas Farm Bureau.

Many farmers also hold out for grants, and — the clincher for those considering loans — FSA’s interest rate on emergency loans is higher than on its normal ones.

Along with emergency loans, FSA offers disaster grants under its Supplemental Revenue Assistance Program that don’t have to be repaid. The main problem with that program is farmers must wait more than a year to see any money. And, farmers can only apply for losses that happened before Sept. 30 because the program is ending next year.