

Tuesday, June 27, 2006

Drought Across the Plains and Beyond

The Rural Life...

I hate to hear that it's terribly dry in the Nebraska Sandhills, my childhood home. A friend writes to me that the hills are burnt up -- that is, the grass has shriveled and dried to a crispy crunch.

It's extremely dry in southwest Kansas where my brother and sister-in-law live and ranch. The wheat crop in Kansas is severely damaged this year, I've read. There won't be much of a hay crop either.

In Montana where Sarpy Sam ranches, his hay crop is running 1/3 less than normal due to the drought.

Texas and Oklahoma are suffering from a long drought and the drought extends across much of the Great Plains, the Great Basin, and the Southwest, creating fire hazards, creating adverse conditions for both wildlife and domesticated animals, and bringing economic stress to farmers and ranchers.

Even some of the Gulf Coast states like Georgia and Mississippi are dry. Louisiana is in a drought, as hard as that may be to believe.

AgWeb comments that, "Pastures and summer crops remain under varying degrees of drought stress from Texas to the Dakotas, despite last week’s scattered but highly beneficial showers."

A map of drought-stricken areas is provided at the U.S. Drought Monitor.

Let's join in earnest prayer for rain for these drought-stricken areas -- and for a moderation in the rainfall in New England where the floods are!

Kentucky has been fortunate compared to many states. Locally, the water table is low, but we've received enough rain that crops are looking good so far. (Photo of my neighbor's cornfield here.)

O GOD, most Merciful Father, in this our necessity, we beseech Thee to open the windows of heaven, and to send a fruitful rain upon us, to revive the earth, and to refresh the fruits thereof, that we may praise and glorify Thy Name for this Thy mercy; through Jesus Christ, Thy Son, our Lord. Amen.
Prayer Source: Collects and Prayers of the Lutheran Church

O GOD, in Whom we live and move, and have our being, grant us rain, in due abundance, that, being sufficiently helped with temporal, we may the more confidently seek after eternal gifts. Through Christ, our Lord. Amen.
Prayer Source: National Catholic Rural Life Conference

Google search: A prayer for rain

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RunAwayImagination said...

My son and daughter live in the Washington, DC suburbs where they've been getting deluged by torrential rain for days now. They had to close part of the Capital Beltway the other day due to flooding in Alexandria.

It seems ironic that the part of the country where they really need rain is in the grips of a drought. On the other hand, the part of the country getting all the rain is where the primary harvest is paperwork and hot air. lol

Genevieve said...

Maybe all that hot air coming out of Washington is affecting the climate on the East Coast.

Limey said...

You may be interested to know that I live in an area in which our water authority has issued a drought order, and the other big london metropolitan water authority (Thames Water) has applied for a drought order. This basically means that all non essential use of water should cease, if not we will be subject to stand pipes in the street. We rely quite heavily on winter rains and over the past couple of years they just haven't happened. Maybe Hopkinsville water aren't so bad after all.

Genevieve said...

We'll put you on the prayer list too, Limey. I am sorry to hear that it's dry there! I know the gardeners and farmers are sick at heart.

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