Area farmers losing crops to drought

For most people in the area, the current drought means water restrictions and annoyances such as brown grass and wilted gardens.

But for local farmers the stakes are much higher. Their livelihood depends on rain.

Central North Carolina has accumulated deficits of nearly a year's worth of rainfall since the summer of 1998. The short-term dryness over the past six weeks has exacerbated the long-term problem and brought about conditions not seen in 50 years.

This exceptional drought, as the U.S. Weather Service calls it, has "a dramatic effect on agriculture in general, particularly crops and livestock," Franklin County Cooperative Extension Director Cedric Jones said.

Most Franklin County farmers are about out of water in their irrigation ponds, Jones said. Cattle farmers are also in a bind because the fields where the cows normally graze during the summer months have dried up, forcing farmers to feed the cows with the hay meant for this fall and winter.

There is a possibility that Franklin County's beef farmers will receive some federal aid through the U.S. Department of Agriculture, but no funds have been granted yet, Jones said.

Stewart May of May Farms near Louisburg has been hit hard by the drought. "I've had to feed the cows seven to eight bales of hay every day since the drought started, which creates a hay shortage," May said. If conditions do not improve soon, "a lot of times the only recourse is to sell the livestock."

The cucumber crop at May Farms this season is also weak due to the drought. There are two to three times as many nubs, or cucumbers too small to be of any real value this year, translating into major profit losses for the Mays.

The irrigated tobacco crop at May Farms is looking fairly healthy now. But according to Stewart's brother, Ricky May, the water supply will be depleted within days.

The fields that are not heavily irrigated are producing smaller, less profitable tobacco plants, some of which have Granville Wilt, a disease worsened by the dry conditions.

Larry Wilder, who grows corn, wheat and soybeans in Franklin County, is also feeling the effects of the drought. "I've never seen it this bad this time of year," he said, adding that July is usually the driest month.

"I've lost 95 percent of my corn crop," Wilder said.

Wilder is now faced with the difficult decision of whether or not to double-crop soybeans on the fields where wheat has already been harvested. "Some of us will gamble and double-crop," he said, but there is the fear that the plants will never come up in these dry conditions.

Franklin County beef farmer John Harris Jr. has already been forced to sell 32 cows due to the drought.

"Whether you are a tobacco farmer or a beef producer like I am, it's bad," Harris said. "The bottom line is we need some water and we need it yesterday."

Although the farmers agree every little bit helps, the incidental showers in the region last week offer minimal relief in the long-term drought. According to Stewart May, the crops and pastures need what farmers call a million-dollar rain, a two-day slow falling shower, before conditions can really begin to improve.