Heartbreaking Summer Corn

Here is a picture of our local corn this year.  The drought this summer is an agriculture disaster.  This is sweet corn, but the field corn is worse and the bean crop is almost as bad.  If you shop in stores and aren't close to a rural area you probably won't see this-picture perfect produce will continue to arrive from other parts of the world.  But it will affect prices soon.

While the absence of sweet corn is bad enough, the lack of field corn as feed affects any livestock grower.  Cattlemen can't graze their animals-the grass is all burnt up and they can't afford to buy the corn that is available.  Beef prices will temporarily go down as the cattlemen rush to market the animals as soon as their weight is minimally met, and next year beef prices will probably skyrocket.  Dairy herds are of course in just as bad of shape-we are losing small dairy herds daily.

Not to get political, but the congress adjourned without addressing the farm bill.  While some of the grain farmer's have crop insurance-there is currently no help for the livestock end of things.