I just finished reading an excellent book by a Virginia farmer, that scared the crap out of me.
Don’t suppose the author has been to Michigan, Ohio or Wisconsin. LOTS of farms around here - all east of the Mississippi.
“Eastern vegetables may not be as perfect as those grown under irrigation in a desert, but if the West returns to a drier climate, imperfect vegetables will look good indeed.”
Perfect must not include taste.
A lot of talk about availability of water. How much land is available east of the Mississippi? Are there large tracts of farm land now unused? Maybe everyone there could have a back yard garden to relieve the need for large farms in the west. I’ll look somewhere other that the NYT for advice about agriculture (or anything else for that matter).
Well, no. The biggest factor in the demise of Eastern agriculture was simple economies of scale. By 1980 even the western homestead was obsolete, as the typical 40 to 160 acre family farm had been displaced by major farms covering several thousand acres each. There probably aren't enough contiguous parcels of land east of the Appalachian Mountains that could be used for this kind of operation.
They’ll have to cut down tracts of forest to clear land for farming. What once was farmland is now forest which is what it was before settlers farmed the land. A lot of trust fund babies are gonna start crying.
Nice idea, but not gonna happen. First reason is the trees.
Used to be 100 years ago, the trees were all cleared and there were subsistence farms everywhere in extreme Northeast PA. Now the trees are back covering all of what used to be farmed 100 years ago. All over the Northeast as you drive along roads you will see stonewalls wandering off into the woods. Those woods used to be open fields.
Environmentalists aren’t going to let trees be cut. They represent potential habitat for wolves, cougar, lynx and moose.
Not to mention that the author’s estimate of water needed for crops is way off base (too low). Also the water in many of the big rivers in the East is already allocated. Where we live the Delaware River Basin Authority was mumbling something about limiting private water wells in Northeast PA to “save” water in the aquifer for the big cities downstream.
I do believe every person who can should have a garden and grow fruits and vegetables for one’s family.
**Richard T. McNider and John R. Christy are professors of atmospheric science at the University of Alabama in Huntsville.**
What the hell do they know about farming?
Meanwhile, its a miracle that we still have folks with five acres to plant corn on here in Central New Jersey.
cotton should be removed from arizona and california because it is water intensive.
we need the water for other uses.
I just finished reading an excellent book by a Virginia farmer, that scared the crap out of me.
One thing the Northeast has along with their disasterous liberal high regulation governments, collapsed economies and solidly Blue political color is WATER. If the libs can find a way to help farmers instead of punishing them the Noretheast could indeed once again become a breadbasket economy.