The U.S. Northeast, home to 175,000 farms, is under the worst drought in more than a decade, says the NPR blog The Salt. “Many fields are bone dry,” says NPR, “and that has many farmers thinking about how to manage their land, their animals and the water that is there.”
Massachusetts farmer Mike Wissemann, whose farm borders the Connecticut River, says irrigation is an added chore during the busy season, so he ran out of time to plant some of his second round of vegetable crops. Bill Fosher, who raise cattle in southern New Hampshire, says some farmers worry the drought will put them out of business because they can’t harvest forage for their livestock and it’s expensive to buy feed. With drought, Fosher says, “even if you do everything just right, it still wouldn’t matter.”
The weekly Drought Monitor says Manchester, NH, received 1.1 inches of rain on Aug. 22 — the first time a rainstorm exceeded one inch since Sept. 30, 2015. Boston is more than seven inches behind normal on rainfall this year. Buffalo, NY, is 8.25 inches below normal. Severe to extreme drought covers most of Massachusetts and western New York State as well as the southeastern corner of New Hampshire. Connecticut and New Hampshire were in moderate drought. The Drought Monitor uses a four-step scale to describe drought, beginning with moderate drought and ascending through severe and extreme drought to the worst rating, exceptional drought.