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Drought

When you talk of cycles you are correct....Climatologists studying tree rings and soil samples in the Great Plains have determined that droughts move into areas or all of the plains in cycles--and just like with the 100 year flood in different intensitys...

The bad part of their study is that none of us have seen any of the real bad ones--as they have evidence of droughts with the severity of the 30's dust bowl era lasting for 50-70 years....

Hope that one starts after I'm gone.....
 
Tap: I reread my post and hope you didn't think I was jumping all over you... just pointing out some reasons for the worries...
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Hey, I have a little thicker skin than that Ranch Mom. Like I said, I understand that it hurts when it costs an operation money due to drought.

Maybe it is time to hire the "rainmaker" from up in Montana. It worked in Oldtimers country. He can't seem to miss the last years.
 
But it looks the worst from Sterling, ND down to Mobridge, SD west to Isabel.
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The wedding we went to in Bismarck, everyone we knew (on the grooms side) was from Corson Co., SD. And everyone talked about rain all weeekend. They were really hurting. (And it didn't help that it poured in Bismarck, twice! while we were up there)

but a friend of ours said he has a neighbor who was hauling pairs to the sale barn this week. To beat the rush. :(
 
It is dry here too. Good moisture March and April, were above normal, prospects for a hay crop looked good. Hardly any rain in May. May and June are our wetest months. Valentine reported only .25 during May. I had a little less than that. Dryest year on record, 1966 had .45 I remember corn didn't sprout that year.

We live in a semi-arid area we need to learn to cope with it. There are ways to better survive drought. Tough maybe, but there are ways. My dad once said "if we could just raise crops like we used to" I told him "this is the kind of crops we raise here" My old High School teacher,
( he was a farmer too) once said " We are always looking for that bumper crop. That only happens about three times in a life time, Two times have already pasted".
 
Tap your post about that big flood reminded of a story. I can't remember if I read on here or not but it fits this thread.

Tourist was talking to a old rancher when the rancher said that they get about 12 inches of rain a year. The tourist said that sure wasn't much rain and the rancher said "You should be here the day we get it"
 
We are so dry that there is no dew to bale our dried out wilted alfalfa. We are cutting our wheat now for hay as it has burned up. We are hoping it will rain to plant some sorgum sudan and cane........
 
Katrina wrote:
We are so dry that there is no dew to bale our dried out wilted alfalfa. We are cutting our wheat now for hay as it has burned up. We are hoping it will rain to plant some sorgum sudan and cane........
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How do the cows eat the wheat you cut? We tried that and some of them got their throats and mouth so full of beards they couldn't eat. One died.
Might be OK if you could grind it.
 
If I remeber right when I fed it years ago, I upped the Iodine levels and I think there still might have been one or two lumps........nothing a little med wouldn't clear up. Oh and the cows got fat and slick.
 
There are some good posts on this thread. I will try to make one more point. The normally wet areas feel the severity of the drought worse because they are less likely to have the reserves stocked up to endure the ordeal. Additionally an area like ours that normally takes 5 acres to summer a cow calf that gets an inch of moisture won't be benefited as much as an area that takes 20 acres to summer a cow calf pair and gets an inch of moisture.


With that said one still has to manage a drought so that you can live to fight another day. I see way too many in this area just waiting and hoping that it rains enough to get by. Not a good strategy in my book but they got by the last time in 2002 when we got some moisture in early July and mid August.


I can remember the bad years here in 1976 and 1988 when we got virtually no rain all summer. I just hope I won't be adding 2006 to the list but if I had to lay odds I would bet that we will. We just never got the Spring moisture that it takes to get us through the Summer.
 
It's in the boot stage.. Still green (kinda) I don't think it has filled well or at all...... Anyway we will grind it with our alfalfa......
I think the hardest thing for me, is the fact that it is what my husband loves.... farming.... He pours over decesions to be made clear in December. What to plant what kind.....costs.... And it is a hell of alot of work long hours....... And to have absouletly no control of the out come... To me that is really tough... We looked beautiful a month ago....Maybe counting our chickens before thay hatched. ( so to speak) And whammy...... Very hot windy days all in a row and the most vulnerable time for winter wheat....... We'll be okay, we have options and life goes on.... And last year was better so we have a stockpile of hay and some grain.... I guess it just builds charecter.... Very humbling........ :|
 
A couple years ago, my dad ended up having to feed plain wheat straw. He uses a bale processor and I believe he sprayed it with some sort of molasses protein mixture to help them eat it and get what they need. We thought for sure they would get it poking through their guts. They didn't love it, but it did work. :???: :shock:

I have heard of lots of people feeding wheat hay that is still green. Others have said that Wheat hay with the wheat in the heads is excellent feed, the cattle love it.

Our brother grazed wheat standing that was bearded out and changing color, they ate it to the ground. They got fat and slick and loved it. Maybe dumb luck but they had no troubles.
 
I want to caution folks that feeding wheat hay alone can cause "Winter Tetnany". It is a condition similar to Grass Tetnany. Wheat hay can often have a calcium-potassium-magnesium imbalance with the cows exhibiting symptoms like Grass Tetnany.

You can do a couple of things. Feed a hi-mag mineral with low phos content (wheat is high in phos and cattle won't overeat phos. If you
use a low-phos mineral the cattle will consume more and therefore
ingest more of the trace minerals.) Or you can mix some other hay
with the wheat hay and that will help as well.
 

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