CHICAGO (Dow Jones)--Portions of Minnesota's soybean crop saw freezingtemperatures in some areas over the weekend, causing concern of frostkilling underdeveloped soybean plants. Agronomists, though, maintain thatthe effect of the very low temperatures was negligible."The crop was not harmed very badly at all," said Steve Sodeman, cropconsultant in Martin County, Minn., noting that far less than 1% of thecrop was affected by the cold temperatures.Sodeman said he did not see frost himself, but did hear about itforming in other parts of the state.According to Seth Naeve, soybean agronomist at the University ofMinnesota, the freezing temperatures were isolated to western and northernareas of the belt. According to the National Weather Service, westerntowns such as Appleton, Minn., and northern towns such as Little Falls sawtemperatures as low as 32 degrees Fahrenheit.Temperatures must fall to about 28 degrees for at least one hour tokill a soybean plant, Naeve said.Some spots along the edges of fields, Sodeman said, showed a change toa more yellowish color, indicating early maturity that might have beenhastened by the weekend's drop in temperatures."All we got was a superficial burning you could see on the upperleaves," he said.Naeve said that in the northern part of the state where the coldtemperatures were more severe, losses could amount to more than 25%. Butbecause soybean fields were so far behind in development, they would nothave likely made it past a normal frost date."They were so far behind, it's likely they would have been frostedanyway," he said.But the real issue, Sodeman said, is not the freezing temperatures.Rather, it is the early maturity that is now resulting from the coolgrowing conditions. Because soybean plants take their cues from theenvironment on when to begin maturing, the soybean crop in southernMinnesota started showing signs of the early stages of maturity aroundAug. 15, Sodeman said. Normally, soybean plants in the area do not beginturning color until Aug. 25-30.Consequently, development has been cut short, leavingfewer-than-normal pods on the plants. The number of nodes, which areclusters of soybean pods on the branches of the plant, are down to around10 this year, when they normally total about 12, Sodeman said. A good nodecount would be from 15 to 18, he added.The plants are also shorter than normal, he said, which will causeproblems later during harvest."There'll probably be a 3-5 bushel (per acre) loss because the beansare too close to the ground and too low for the combine to get," he said.Looking ahead, a warm September would not likely have significantbenefit to the southern Minnesota crop, Sodeman said."Warm weather won't really change it," he said. "Once they start toyellow, it's about 30 days to harvest."The U.S. Department of Agriculture currently has Minnesota figured atproducing 292 million bushels with a yield of 40 bushels per acre, up from229.4 million produced last year with a yield of 31 bushels.