Waiting on Rain

feeding hay in the summer is a sure sign of dry times

Like much of the rest of the country, rain has been a scarce commodity over the past few weeks. Our silage corn and the sorghum we've planted is off to a slow start, and our bermudagrass hay fields and pastures are more or less just sitting there. A half-inch of rain last week did perk the plants up a little bit, but we need more and we need it fast. Hopefully the current weather forecast, which is predicting a pretty decent chance for rain this week, will bear out.

Our cows and heifers have kept us busy while we've been waiting on rain, at least. Over the past few weeks we've given all our animals their annual vaccination boosters and have moved many of them into fresh pastures. Our milking herd continues to decrease in numbers as pregnant cows are being "dried off" faster than dry cows are calving back in. We currently stand at 161 cows in milk, with several due to dry off next week.

We'll be back in the field planting the remainder of our sorghum and sudex crops as soon as we receive enough rain to loosen the ground. Until then, we'll keep waiting and watching and praying for some relief.