Some home gardeners are finding this is the worst year they’ve experienced with high temperatures and a dearth of rain making it hard to grow anything. Local vegetable growers who have been in business for many years aren’t immune to the problems.
“The drought is certainly stressing my garden,” said Larry Lowman, who operates Ridgecrest Gardens in southern Carroll County. “But we’ve had worse years recently, 2011 and 2012, notably. I can mitigate drought quite effectively, employing drip irrigation on most of my crops, and I have a good water supply. The problem this year is the excessive heat situation. Several of my crops are negatively impacted if the temp rises above 95° to 100° for any length of time.”
Pollen on corn is killed around 95° or above, and a similar thing applies to lima beans, and slightly higher temperatures to regular true beans. Southern field peas are tougher, being native to Africa. But Larry has observed that even Southern field peas and tomatoes are having flowers/pollen scalded by the heat, wind, and unusually intense sun.
“No clouds in the sky all day long is tough on these plants, and that intense solar radiation is heating the soil to levels hot enough it kills seedlings and young plants, and fries some green leaves close to the ground,” he said. “Most of my mature crops are mulched, but the wind blowing across the surrounding areas picks up the heat from the soil and blasts the plants like a convection oven. I work barefooted almost always, so my feet are pretty dang tough, but by 11 a.m. these past few mornings, I cannot walk barefooted on bare dirt… it’s too hot.
“So, the intense heat/sun is greatly reducing yields on most peas/beans/limas and tomatoes by damaging or destroying blossoms. It’s frustrating to see otherwise large and healthy plants not yielding anything, not able to set pods or fruit. The squash is doing okay and the sweet ‘taters are doing great.”
On the plus side, there was a fairly moist winter preceding this, and a wet spring. So, there was fairly good subsoil moisture supply going into this drought.
“I’m not seeing any large trees showing stress yet,” said Larry, who is also a well-regarded naturalist. “I’m seeing small trees, shrubs and non-woody vegetation showing stress widely…. especially stuff on rocky slopes or ledges. My hay meadow is mostly brown and would burn readily. It depresses me to see the plants in stress, and especially when large trees begin to fade. So, maybe we won’t get that bad. At this point, we are not as dry as 2011 or 2012, and have not gotten as hot.
“This has become the fourth worst drought event in my life. The worst, hands down, was 1980, then 2012, which followed 2011, for a back-to-back consecutive year disaster pairing, and now this. I certainly hope we get some relief soon, and this year does not move up in my ranking. At this moment, my ag service meteorology service is progging some relief for us later this week in both temps, and with chances of precipitation spread over multiple days. So, surely hoping that forecast outlook verifies!”
Ridgecrest hasn’t experienced significant precipitation since May. The last time to receive significant rainfall was a three-day spell on May 24/25/26 when there was 1.7 inches. Larry had only one inch during the month of June, and that fell as three separate small showers, all less than a half inch during the second week of June, and those little showers did nothing at all to help my garden plants or local vegetation.
“So far during July, I received only one-quarter inch,” he said. “So, it has been two months since a good rain. It has varied a lot around Carroll County, and some folks lucked into heavy rains during June and July more than once. A friend only three miles from me got nearly three inches during June. Some folks have just lucked out in the precipitation lottery. And that’s evidence the drought is not quite as serious as past ones.”
And so far, this year has not been as extreme at his farm as the drought/heat wave of 2012 where he observed a high one August afternoon of 113. That was made even more awful, especially for plants, by a brisk southwest wind that day. The wind felt quite hot on your face.
“That same day the high temp in Fort Smith was 118 degrees,” Larry said. “Let’s hope we don’t get close to that this summer!”
Andrew Schwerin, co-owner of Sycamore Bend Farm, said this spring and early summer have many similarities with 2011 – historical floods in April and a very wet May. He said 2011 was a bit more intense with nary a drop of rain or a cloud in the sky in June and July, and overnight temps not once below 70°.
“This year we had about an inch of rain in early June here, and occasional clouds, sprinkles, and cooler nights,” Andrew said. “The long-term forecast through early August continues with hot and dry weather.”
This past winter the Schwerins invested in drilling a well down to the Roubidoux aquifer. With drip irrigation and straw mulch, they can keep the soil sufficiently moist. But now their one-acre oasis of green has become a popular refuge for insects, armadillos and deer.
“So, our workload increases and our production decreases,” Andrew said. “We’ve taken out many crops that are usually harvested to frost, but the expectation is to plant a larger fall garden in August. The drought is more significant in the sheep pastures, where there is limited irrigation infrastructure. Where the sheep usually take 12 days to eat an acre of good forage, they now eat everything that’s green in two days. It is going to be hard going for grass farmers if this pattern persists.”
Andrew was eyeing some possible drought relief the last few days of July.
“We have had this setup before, and I remember plenty of clouds, but undependable rainfall,” he said. “We really could use upwards of eight inches. But if we – or some of us – were so lucky as to get a couple inches, that would put a temporary dent in the drought situation. We’ll see what happens.”