National drought could rival Dust Bowl days (NYT)

[somone]

http://www.nytimes.com/2011/07/12/us/12drought.html

Drought Spreads Pain From Florida to Arizona
By KIM SEVERSON and KIRK JOHNSON

COLQUITT, Ga. — The heat and the drought are so bad in this southwest corner of Georgia that hogs can barely eat. Corn, a lucrative crop with a notorious thirst, is burning up in fields. Cotton plants are too weak to punch through soil so dry it might as well be pavement.

Farmers with the money and equipment to irrigate are running wells dry in the unseasonably early and particularly brutal national drought that some say could rival the Dust Bowl days.

“It’s horrible so far,” said Mike Newberry, a Georgia farmer who is trying grow cotton, corn and peanuts on a thousand acres. “There is no description for what we’ve been through since we started planting corn in March.”

The pain has spread across 14 states, from Florida, where severe water restrictions are in place, to Arizona, where ranchers could be forced to sell off entire herds of cattle because they simply cannot feed them.

[Zoeisright]

1. This is only the beginning.

That's what climate change means - the swings of drought to flood are going to become more extreme. More very hot days and very cold days. That's what stupid repukes don't get.

[JCMach1]

2. sick of the hyperbole... is the NYT now FOX?

The drought is bad, but stop it already...

[Shagbark Hickory]

3. GA is a tough place to grow corn.

The time of the year corn grows the rain is irregular at best. Long dry spells lasting about a month are not uncommon while temps can be in the mid to upper 90s and sometimes in the low 100's. Corn is a real water hog. I've seen some nearby farmers try to grow it and often it dies in the field.