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'It just crumbles into dust' Local farmers stress over dry soil, lack of rain

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Farmers around southwestern Ontario are beginning to grow anxious, as the hot dry summer puts this season’s harvest into question.

“I’m down the length of this knife, which is probably a good three inches, and there’s nothing there,” said Thorndale area farmer Crispin Colvin as he scraped away at the dry soil in a field of corn.

“And that’s the problem we’ve got, it just crumbles into dust.”

A local director of the Ontario Federation of Agriculture, Colvin said lack of rain for crops such as corn and soybeans will mean a lack of yields at harvest time.

“It’s been close to a month with no rain at all, and that’s where the impact hurts the most, he said. “You need the combination, rain, sun, cool days, warm days,” he said. “We’re not getting that. We’re getting straight heat, and it’s getting tough on the crops.”

One crop most of us don’t think much about, as it doesn’t end up in the produce section of our grocery stores, is hay.

According to Colvin, hay is also struggling in the heat. It’s needed to feed livestock and is a major ingredient of food production.

That’s why Embro area cattle farmer Kenny Ulch said he expects the cost to feed his cows is about to spike.

“I know one other year we had a dry year and through that, it doubled the price of hay a year,” he said. “It all depends on Mother Nature.”

While maple syrup is not something that’s top of mind in the summertime, Embro area sugar bush operators Harv and Liz West tell CTV News that the arid conditions now are going to be felt next year when it’s time to tap the maples.

“Sometimes too much heat, you don’t get as much sap in the spring,” explained Harv West. “It all depends. It’s a small window of opportunity that we have. We need rain badly. We really do.”

So what does it all mean for consumers already feeling the sting of inflation?

Unfortunately, said Colvin, one of the few things guaranteed to grow in these conditions is our grocery bill.

“We will probably see some stressful times late fall, winter- when we may not have the products we’re used to having at the prices we’d like to see them at.” 

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