The Dog Days of Summer

Rain. It’s the spindle around which most folks today wrap their conversation.

More specifically, it’s the lack of rain that now keeps farmers awake at night and gives those town folk who pass by fields of shriveled corn and dormant soybeans reason to stop by the neighbor’s place to share their woe. And why not rail on about the weather? It’s really the only topic on which all people – democrats and republicans, professionals and working class, old and young, city bred or rural – can agree. Mother Nature wields her wrath without prejudice. Six steady weeks of cloudless sky will scorch the rich man’s ground as thoroughly as it does the poor man’s. On cracked earth, people can find common ground.

Despite the drought, the soybean field across from Four Cedars Farms maintains the perception of health; the field is richly green and the leaves bow to a southeasterly breeze in supple waves. At the foot of a muggy breeze, the crop looks alive – vibrant. It is a lie. The plants have shut down and unless a significant rain comes soon, this crop will be as worthless as the corn crop that some farmers around the state have already begun to plow under.

And this is farming. You work the ground to ensure the proper nutrients are present for the seed you eventually sow – always with optimism. You fight bugs and weeds and late spring frosts and mechanical breakdowns (which occur more regularly than rain) and then, you wait. And you hope.

Each year the challenges come in different form, but reliably each year, the challenges arrive. This year, the challenge is drought, and the solution isn’t sitting on a shelf at Tractor Supply. This is farming – as seen over the fence at Four Cedars Farms.