Bring on the rain!!

Yes, I realize that most of the country has had a significant amount of precipitation recently, be it snow, ice or rain. In fact, parts of North and East Texas got some pretty heavy duty thunderstorms and rain on Monday. Those storms formed over Montague County and our 30 mph winds blew them right on over and didn't start pouring buckets until they got to the Metroplex and ruined your Monday morning commute. I hope the rain did your concrete some good!

The large hay pasture next to the house-
it's supposed to be green

However, we haven't had more than a trace of rain (4 inches of ice, actually) since the first week of February. Humidity is low, winds are high, temps are nearly in the 90s (already!!) and our land is crying out for moisture. Add to that months worth of dead grass, dried leaves, and people not paying attention to the burn ban and you've got the perfect recipe for an all-consuming wild fire. I know of two in our county in the past 5 years. So scary and devastating it's beyond words.

Beef cows "grazing" last summer's grass pasture

We rely soooo heavily on rain to make our pastures green so the cows can have something to eat. Our county boasts cattle numbers that rank it 124th in the country per capita. Most of those are cow-calf or stocker operations that rely on bermuda or wheat-pasture grazing for nutrition and growth. Almost all of this is what is called dry-land farming (i.e. no irrigation). Another big agricultural industry is bailing hay. Most of this is coastal bermuda- again, not irrigated. This is what we feed our dairy cows, especially in the winter when there is no green grass. Generally we will cut and bale 150 acres 3-4 times during a summer and make hay to feed our cows. Because dairy cows produce so much milk, they need a ton of nutritious food to support their metabolism. Cows get most of their nutrition from a feed ration (kind of like multi-grain cereal) but they also need lots of bulky fiber in the form of hay. If we don't make enough hay, we will have to buy it which drives up our cost of production. Not a good situation. At all.

Pray for rain!!!