Crops
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A late-season blizzard last weekend has caused tremendous problems for farmers in Oklahoma and Kansas. According to a story this week in AgWeb, thousands of cattle have died in the storm and many others are starving because of lack of access to food. The story notes that “As much as 75 percent of the U.S.…
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Lee Shearer of the Athens Banner-Herald posted an interesting story today about land use changes across Georgia in the past few decades. Climatologists know that changes in land from bare group crops to forests can cause changes in the local climate because of how it changes the energy balance. Similarly, changing land from fields to…
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Sammy Fretwell of The State has published two related stories this week on the growth of very large farms which are replacing forests in South Carolina. In one article it says that “In the past four years, out-of-state agribusinesses have purchased nearly 10,000 acres in the Edisto River basin, chopped down forests and established mega…
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Last week a group of water experts from around the State of Georgia gathered together in Athens GA to discuss results of their research on water availability in the Southeast at the biennial Georgia Water Resources Conference. Lee Shearer of the Athens Banner-Herald wrote an article this week describing some of the information presented there.…
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The Packer has an interesting story this week on how producers are dealing with the fall-out of the killing frost in mid-March. While blueberries and peaches took a significant hit, there will still be some crops available. Other fruit like blackberries were not affected by the frost and strawberries have come back strong after the…
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The State Climate Office of North Carolina has made an online tool for predicting thrip infestations for cotton available that producers might find useful. It can also be used on mobile phones. It uses an interactive map to choose the location and allows you to pick a planting date and a choice of models. You…
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The Flagpole weekly newspaper in Athens GA had an interesting story last week about how the swings in weather in recent weeks (the mid-March frost preceded by and followed by above-normal temperatures) has affected small farmers in northeast Georgia. Some farmers that provide vegetables for local farmers markets noted that the warm weather early in…