Paul Starceski of Sherman said the distinct lack of rain before the last few days may be harmful to both hay and corn growth.

“We definitely need the rain, a lot of the hay fields are going to get hurt,” Starceski said. “Some corn is starting to curl up and that’s not good, depending on the stage of growth the corn yields might be lower.”

Other Sherman farmers, such as Ben Nickerson, said so far they have been lucky with the weather not affecting them as much as in other places.

“We’ve been pretty lucky to be sitting in a spot that has gotten it from time to time,” Nickerson said. “The other side of the county definitely has some areas that haven’t had as much.”

A load of hay parked under the overpass of I-86 during the rain on Tuesday night, parked there to keep it dry as it had yet to be wrapped. Submitted photo

The lack of rain before this week has not been the only concern weather-wise for farmers. Sporadic weather over the course of the spring has also led to some challenges for them.

“We were late getting our first cutting of hay in this spring because of how wet the weather was”, said Greg Wolcott, dairy and goat farmer and owner of Wall Street Grazers at Wall Street Dairy LLC in Mayville. “And now, because of the extreme heat and dry weather, the pastures aren’t growing like they should and our second crop of hay is a quarter of what the tonnage should be. If we don’t have a decent and more normal fall, we could likely be short on feed and need to purchase it. While we don’t know what impact this has had on the quality yet, I’m very concerned about the quantity.”

Jeff Winton, founder and CEO of Rural Minds, a national nonprofit organization headquartered in Chautauqua County that focuses on mental health equity for the 46 million people who live in rural America, noted that it is not just the weather this year that has been causing stress for farmers, but a lot of what is going on in the world as well. He added that the amount of extreme weather conditions seen across the country this year are not helping the matter either.

“Farmers across this country have been confronted with extreme weather conditions this year, from California to Texas to the Midwest to the Northeast,” Winton said. “Regardless of what commodities are being raised, farmers are under more stress and pressure this year than during the past several years. Already nervous about new tariffs and a shrinking labor force and other issues resulting from decisions being made in Washington, extreme weather conditions are exacerbating the anxiety and depression levels of these hard-working people who raise our food and fiber.”

According to the National Weather Service in Buffalo, additional rain is possible this weekend and next week.

Rain clouds are pictured overtop of a cornfield in Clymer on Tuesday afternoon as the first bit of rain the area has had in a while moved in. P-J photo by Sara Holthouse