Drought 2012 and other challenges

We have had a lot of people asking us how the drought has affected us this year.  Well it hasn't been good, but I can say it's been somewhat better than some of the pictures I have been seeing from farther out in the Midwest.  We have had three rainfalls since early June.  1.6 inches on July 3rd, 0.4 inches on July 19th and 1.5 inches on August 10th.  It's pretty bad when you can remember when it rained and how much it rained for the last 2+ months.  The July 3rd rain really saved the day for a lot our plants that were newly transplanted in the ground.  However, the plants that got transplanted after July 3rd only had that little bit of rain on July 19th so they are pretty stunted.  In fact walking back through a good bit of the vegetable plants gives the feeling that I am walking through the land of the Lilliputians.  Mike was not thrilled when I said I was going to be posting some of these pictures but I told him that this is the year of the drought and people should see what challenges farmers face in dry years.  Now some of the vegetables are doing halfway decent and I'll save those for future blogs, but here is a tour of how the drought has affected our vegetable farm.

These celery root plants were planted about a week or two after the July 3rd rain, so they have been in the ground for over a month.  They are still smaller than my cell phone.

The broccoli plants themselves are not too bad size-wise, but they are either not forming a discreet head, more like a cluster of little shoots like in this plant

Or if they are forming a head, the broccoli heads are very small.

I couldn't find any good comparison pictures of an individual broccoli head from past years, but here is a picture of some large bins of broccoli that we sold in 2010 (These bins are the size of the big bins that you often see watermelons stored in at the grocery store).  A big difference in size to be sure.

Then here are some green beans that are out in the field right now.  The plants are not much bigger than this water bottle and they are starting to flower and will be forming pods soon.

Then there are two different patches of sweet corn that were planted at approximately the same time.  The first patch should be taller than this, but it is growing in the wettest corner of the field and actually produced pretty well for us.  This is the corn that my mom, my sister and I put up in the freezer last week to enjoy all winter long.

And there this is the patch that is planted in a drier area of the field.  This sweet corn variety normally produces plants that are about 7 feet tall but they are tasseling and are not even waist high.  I have no idea why I am smiling in this picture because I really really REALLY love this variety of sweet corn and it is sad to see it like this.

Mike has replanted some of the cold tolerant plants such as carrots, spinach and beets and is hoping for a late frost.  Those seeds are just starting to come up.  All of the earlier plantings died in the ground due to lack of rain.

And since the blog is entitled "Drought 2012 and Other Challenges", I thought I would show a few pictures of how wildlife can impact crops.  We actually have not had too many problems with raccoons in the sweet corn until just this past week.  Perhaps it was because we wiped out the family that decimated the early blueberry crop and it took awhile for new ones to find their way over here.  Who knows, but they are here now.  We are tolerating the damage right now, but will have to start setting traps again if the problem escalates.

And then last but not least is a look at the soybeans planted this year.  The bushel per acre yield will be lower than average but so much better than what has been happening in the hardest hit drought area of the Midwest.  Overall the plants do not look too bad.

But you don't have to look far to find areas of the field that sit next to a groundhog den.  Pretty impressive groundhog damage shows why farmers hate groundhogs.  From standing in waist high beans in the previous photo to standing in beans that aren't even knee high.

I asked Mike if he thought last year's disastrous year when we had over 2 feet more rain than normal was better or worse than this year and he said it was too early to tell.  It really depends on what happens with all the late plantings of vegetables.