Please Be Kind!
The rain, the clouds, the heavy dew…it just won’t quit right now! We seem to inundated with moisture! The farmers’ good moods are dwindling! Scratch that…they are gone, flushed down the stream, or sewer system with the rain! They are down-right grumpy (several, but not all of them) and I don’t blame them one bit!
For the past several years the farmers have had less than ideal growing conditions! In ’08 there were floods in June that washed out many fields…either taking the seed with it or killing the young corn/beans that were underwater! In ’09 the spring one of the wettest in a decade or so…causing a delay in planting or washing out areas that had previously been planted.
If you know anything about farming (and if you don’t, I’ll help you out here) you know that the whole year attributes to the kind of harvest the farmers will have! This means that the wetter the spring/early summer, the slower the corn will grow. The wetter the soil, the worse off a seed is. If there are a lot of wet days (and fewer sunny warm days), the slower the corn matures. Last year, we had one of the coolest summers we’ve had in almost as long as I can remember. This caused a slow down in the maturing of the corn, causing a wetter harvest, causing the farmers to have less yield with higher drying charges, etc.
Farming is a domino theory, of sorts! A has to be ideal to make B happen in order for C to occur! A wet spring not only affects the way the corn does or does not grow, but can cause the farmers to have to pay more in seed and chemicals.
So, maybe the farmers are grumpy, but I don’t blame them and I ask you to please be kind to them right now!
3 comments
Permalink • 1
I dunno, but if the crops are growing at all like my garden, they ought to be VERY happy!
I suppose it’s a fine line between enough and too much, though.
Permalink •
You are right, it is a happy balance. And, it’s not that the crops aren’t growing because they are, but you also have to remember that they’re crops are in the field for several months, instead of weeks like MOST of our garden items (green beans, etc.). They must be able to get into the fields to spray for weeds, bugs, fungi, etc. All those things, if they can’t be done, can hurt their crop come this fall. And right now, not being able to be spraying or adding nitrogen has them on edge!
Permalink • 2
Its kind of like a double edged sword this year, the thing that wears on me more than the weather is the fact that the corn market is below the cost of production, while it is hard to know what to expect with yields right now we can look at the cash price and know with 100% of yield it isnt enough to pay the bills.