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I can’t let Halloween go without putting up a couple of spooky climate stories. Here are two. Vampire bats live naturally in Central and South America, but have been moving north with the warmer climate. They can weaken cattle by sucking blood from the animals and can sometimes carry diseases like rabies. You can read…
Posted in: Climate and Ag in the news -
UPDATE: Time corrected to 2 pm EST After our stellar attendance at the last special drought webinar, we want to make sure that people know we are doing a follow-up drought webinar to update us in the Southeast about how recent rains have affected dry conditions in the Southeast, including impacts on water resources and…
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The latest Drought Monitor, released this morning, shows a continuation of the improvement in drought conditions that we saw last week as we transitioned away from the flash drought towards more rainy conditions. While there are still pockets of extreme drought in Alabama, Georgia and South Carolina, they are smaller. Parts of central Georgia are…
Posted in: Drought -
Although many areas of Georgia have seen good amounts of rain in the last week, some areas have still been missed and are quite dry. UGA peach specialist Dario Chavez reminds peach farmers that watering your trees in the off-season will help them survive the drought and improve production next year in this article at…
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Since there is a chance of severe weather today, I thought this article about television meteorologists and severe weather warnings might be appropriate. After every severe weather event, if television meteorologists break into regular shows (whether sports, Dancing with the Stars, or a favorite drama), they get slammed by viewers complaining about the coverage. This…
Posted in: Climate and Ag in the news -
While temperature and related growing degree days help control how fast corn and other crops develop, it’s less well known that solar radiation also has an effect. If it’s warm but cloudy, the corn growth will be slower than if skies are sunny. This is one reason that we are planning to put a solar…
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You’ve probably heard about the massive forest fires that are spreading through parts of California, and you might have even seen some of the images of smoke and flames associated with the fires. But while the fires are affecting the forests in the area, they are also causing problems for agricultural producers. The Southeast Farm…