Idaho farmers work together to save neighbor's potato crop

When an Idaho farmer wasn't going to be able to harvest all of his potatoes ahead of an early hard freeze, his neighbors quickly rallied and rushed to save his crop.

Last week, meteorologists in southeast Idaho shared a forecast farmers weren't expecting: a cold snap on Wednesday, the earliest deep freeze in decades. They scrambled to harvest their potatoes before they were ruined, but one farmer in the town of Hamer wasn't going to be able to clear his field in time.

That's when people like Jason Larson and other community members jumped into action. Larson told CNN other farmers sent employees over to help the man, with 50 ultimately offering their assistance. Some had been up until midnight taking care of their own crops, but that didn't stop them from working from 11 a.m. to 8 p.m., when the last potato was harvested.

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Idaho produces 32 percent of American potatoes, and Larson estimates they saved hundreds of thousands of dollars worth of potatoes on the farm. "What people do is they help their neighbor," he told CNN. "There really wasn't a second thought about it."