Posted on 02/09/2014 12:05:15 AM PST by 2ndDivisionVet
Much like the polar vortex spiked demand and prices for natural gas in the eastern U.S., another weather phenomenon — a severe drought — is threatening cattle and milk production and food crops in the West.
It’s a threat that can last for months and year, and parched conditions have already driven up prices on milk and cattle futures.
“The hardest hit section of California is the Central Valley — ‘the supermarket to the world’ — and [it’s becoming] increasingly clear the region won’t see relief from the devastating drought anytime soon,” said Kevin Kerr, editor of CommodityConfidential.com. “Retail prices for many key agricultural commodities could jump.”
That means consumers may see higher prices for everything from beef and milk to wheat, nuts and vegetables, and it’ll take time for supplies to replenish.
Drought conditions cover more than 37% of the 48 contiguous states, according to the U.S. Drought Monitor . MDA Weather Services said about 67% of California alone is currently experiencing extreme or exceptional drought conditions.
The state’s Gov. Edmund “Jerry” Brown, Jr. declared a drought State of Emergency on Jan. 17, calling on California’s residents to voluntarily cut water consumption by 20%.
The state is “already taking steps to limit water usage, so it is likely that irrigation supplies will be limited as well,” said Kyle Tapley, senior agricultural meteorologist of weather services at MDA Information Systems LLC....
(Excerpt) Read more at marketwatch.com ...
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Just so it doesn’t cut into the corn ethanol yields.
Has anyone looked out the window lately?
Has anyone looked out the window lately?
Huh?
.... Most of us who have lived in Kalifornia for a few decades know that the main portion of this drought is due to the brain trust of Environmental activists forcing the diverting of the main water supply used for irrigation away from the desert farmlands and cities and divert it to the delta wetlands to save a few species fish .... some of which no longer exist because they all died out 70-80 years ago.
.... Yup .... Most of this water shortage is self inflicted. But the Kalifornia Braintrust of activists will never admit it!
Not hardly.
http://www.accuweather.com/en/weather-news/rain-snow-drought-west/23076073
...A pattern shift will bring more storms through to the United States Pacific coast.
The drought-stricken areas of the West Coast will continue to get some relief in the coming weeks.
Like the rain and snow this weekend, some of the precipitation with these storms could be heavier, allowing accumulating snow in the mountains and significant rain at lower elevations...
farms are essential...not just important...but ESSENTIAL.....if they need the irrigation water, they should have priority.
Bump
The news here in the East says that parts of California got hit hard by rain storms and were in danger of severe flooding in some parts.
When I want to know what the weather is, I look out the window. Works every time. Weather forecasters ought to try it once in a while.
Love it when a TV weatherman says that there is only a 20% chance of rain or snow, and I look out the window trying to figure whether to build and ark or to get out my snowmobile.
[I’m an optimist. I don’t have either]
“Most of this water shortage is self inflicted. But the Kalifornia Braintrust of activists will never admit it! “
I think you have the guilty parties wrong! The Federal Government has been “managing” our water for years. The California Water Project is a Federal one, not State. But that’s not to say that we don’t have morons in our state water resources agencies too. And in truth, the farmers are partially to blame, since the CWP was originally set up to provide water so that the farmers would quit pumping out of underground sources. Problem was, as soon as the Sacramento River water was sent their way, they simply opened up more land to irrigation and continued their pumping as well. In the Southern San Joaquin Valley the land has subsided in places 50ft or more due to the pumping of groundwater. To add to the mix, in the last major drought, while we in NorCal were flushing our toilets with our bathwater, the morons in LA were watering their lawns and letting the water run down the gutters, with water that the government was shipping them from Northern California. California’s biggest problem is all that lies south of the Tehatchapi Mtns (known informally as Mexico City North). Los Angeles has gone around the state stealing water from everyone, but now the clamps are on. No longer do they get all they need from either the Owens River or the Colorado, because other people have first call on those sources or they have been proscribed by legal action. Personally, I hope they all choke to death, most especially the a$$holes in Hollywierd.
.... Sadly the concept of "Essential Services" here in Kalifornia and as well as in this country under the present administration .... has somehow magically transformed itself through the liberal looking glass into "Essential Special Interests" where there is no place for common sense in the new psyche of the liberal mind.
I have been urging everyone -
lettuce, cabbage/broccoli/kale, carrots, radishes.
Get the seeds. Put them in the ground. THEY ACTUALLY GROW!!!
Why don’t you take a peek! Here’s what we have going on right now!
http://radar.weather.gov/Conus/pacnorthwest.php
” Yup .... Most of this water shortage is self inflicted. But the Kalifornia Braintrust of activists will never admit it! “
this is the difference between the Nazis and the new (and smarter) Marxists. the Nazis just put on an arm band and held a gun to your head, so that there was no ambiguity.
now, ways to disrupt our freedom, like creating a drought to prevent our access to affordable food, can be denied. and with the help of the media, 90 per cent of the population will believe its a drought.
The good news is that none of this will contribute to inflation. Because as the government knows food and energy prices fluctuate so much that they can safely be eliminated from the core inflation measure.
“if there is drought and the farms need water, IMO they should close down all pools...all fountains....limit watering of lawns on public lands....”
Well they have done that in the past. And you had better wish us well, unless you have a big garden, because California supplies 80% or more of the country’s fresh fruits and vegetables. Plus a lot of other foodstuffs that all of you who want to see us drop off into the Pacific need to survive.
To a lot of you we are like the local airport, you all want to be able to fly, but none of you want us for a neighbor. We will be eating first, you can have the leftovers!
And they should be given free use of all BLM land, and they should be allowed to hire anyone (even illegal aliens) so they can get their crops harvested in a cheap and timely manner, and they should get money whether or not they plant, or whether or not they bring a crop in, and we shouldn’t complain when we see them driving around in bright shiny red trucks that appear to never have been used to haul anything around except their overweight wives and kids.
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