Hot Parched Summer

Ohio still feel­ing effects of drought after the rains

It was the last thing farm­ers in Ohio — or the nation for that mat­ter — needed this year.

We are awash in a hot, parched summer.

More than half of the United States is feel­ing some level of drought. And it is hit­ting home right here in Ohio.

Dur­ing the last week in July, how­ever, many parts of Ohio did get that much-needed relief in the form of heavy rains. But will it be enough now to sal­vage the crop?

“The drought is really hurt­ing us,” High­land County farmer Jim Faust told me early last week. When I decided to write this col­umn about the dry, rain­less sea­son we are hav­ing, I wanted to get the word right from Ohio farm­ers, so I talked to the farm­ers most affected by this bone-dry sum­mer — corn and soy­bean growers.

Faust is nor­mally a corn grower — but not this year. This year he is grow­ing soy­beans on his 250 acres. Despite the prob­lems this region of Ohio is hav­ing, the local farmer was typ­i­cally opti­mistic. He said it appears other states such as Indi­ana and states west are hav­ing a worse drought than “we are hav­ing here in Ohio, and I guess for that we can be grateful.”

The week­end before we spoke, his farm about 11 miles south­west of Hills­boro received a small rain, about half an inch. “It did perk my beans up, I could see it,” but he added that south­ern Ohio needs a “lot more water. We really need rain.”

He said he and fel­low farm­ers need at least two to three inches of rain that week, and thereafter.

The prospects? He said it all will depend on the next few weeks.

“Some of the corn is right on the edge of being too far gone. This hot weather has been hard on pol­li­na­tion,” Faust pointed out. And that means the crops are suffering.

At the recent Fayette County Fair, farm­ers gath­ered and talked about their predica­ment. Some were pes­simistic, say­ing that corn crops would not recover. I over­heard one say emphat­i­cally, “The corn is done.” He backed it up by point­ing out that the main pol­li­na­tion time was dur­ing the recent siz­zling hot weather the week of the Fourth of July.

But I found it inter­est­ing that oth­ers gave a dif­fer­ing view, they said that much of the corn crop — along with the crops for other pro­duce such as soy­beans — would be OK… if we get rain.

And that is a very big “if.” On the Wednes­day of the Fayette County Fair, July 18, there was a good rain, but fore­cast­ers were pre­dict­ing that would be the only day of rain for almost a week.

When I talked to Adams County farmer Roger Rhone­mus, who is also an Adams County Com­mis­sioner, last Wednes­day, he was all smiles.

“It’s rain­ing here at the Fair­grounds,” he said. Even with­out the show­ers, Rhone­mus was an opti­mist about the corn crop this year.

He said the pol­li­na­tion in his part of the state looks to be about 75 to 90 per­cent, “it looks good from the ears of corn I have checked.” He said that con­sid­er­ing the lack of rain, he is grate­ful for the pol­li­na­tion of the ears.

Rhone­mus, along with his two sons, grows about 700 acres of corn. “That’s a bit more than it being a hobby,” he joked. He said that going for­ward, “we will need the mois­ture.” He said the rain­fall com­ing up will decide if “we will be shelling corn or popcorn.”

In Adams County, like much of the state, the rain­fall in June and July was way under nor­mal. But Rhone­mus says con­di­tions so far are still bet­ter than the last major drought in 1988.

He spoke aloud a feel­ing that many farm­ers in Ohio share today. He said that while he has crop insur­ance, “I would much rather grow corn than col­lect insurance.”

I think all farm­ers feel that way.

Gary Brock

is Editor-in-Chief

of Acres

Posted by Tina Murdock on Aug 9 2012. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS Feed. Both comments and pings are currently closed.