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Hay – yes, hay – is sucking the Colorado River dry
- bloomingeek 3y agoBack sometime in the early 2000's, the south was under a pretty bad drought. Especially Texas, my wife and I took a flight from DFW to TUL and were shocked at all the dark brown landscape. We even drove over to visit Arkansas, if you've never been, it's a beautiful green, lush state. But back then things were so bad even trees were dying. During this time, I worked with a guy who had about 200 acres of prime land which bordered a good size river. When he noticed the predicted drought, he sold what cattle he owned and planted all his fields with hayseed. The following summer he had semi trucks lined up to buy his round bails, mostly from Texas and Kansas. He made more on hay that year then he made at the job we worked, which then was 70K per year. Last fall another farm friend of mine at work told me the OK agriculture association says that grains and grass will possibly be in short supply this year. I'm a city dweller, but I stocked the pantry just in case. (Not with grass :-) )
- stevespang 3y ago[dead]
- bcrl 3y agoIrrigation for hay even in Colorado is something that shocked me the first time I visited the state. Where I live in eastern Ontario in Canada, hay is just something that grows in fields unattended, no special work required. Driving around Glenwood Springs seeing these giant metal structures in fields to irrigate the hay was an eye opener as to just how little moisture there is in that part of the United States. Within 15 kilometers of home we have on the order of about 10 different lakes of varying sizes -- a completely different experience.
- engineer_22 3y agoRemoving agriculture from the local economy is exactly the opposite of sustainable. Cheap, nutritious food is necessary for the sustainment of advanced economies. If you cannot produce food locally you're dependent on outside sources - a liability.
- AlotOfReading 3y agoNo human is ever going to eat the crops discussed in the article. It's feed grown entirely for livestock. There'd be much less concern if farmers in the Colorado river basin were growing the hyper-efficient flint corn, squash, and beans that have been farmed there for millennia.
- 20after4 3y agoSquash grows completely wild in the middle of the desert in New Mexico.
- deleted 3y ago[deleted]
- deafpolygon 3y agoHay guys.
- deafpolygon 3y agoAw, I was just trying to be a friendly neighhhhhbor.