Over the last several weeks, the drought in Randolph County has become exponentially worse.
According to Randolph County Soil and Water Conservation District Technician John Kirchhoff, who is also a farmer and livestock producer, the drought has been exceptionally hard.
“Here over the past week or so the pastures have turned brown,” Kirchhoff said.
“Even though we’ve had some good rains here… that isn’t going to bring back the hay yield that we lost,” Kirchhoff said.
In response to the issues that farmers and livestock producers are facing in the region, the USDA Natural Resources Conservation Service has enacted an emergency cover crop program to assist those who have been affected by the drought.
Farmers and livestock producers can apply for the cover crop assistance at local NRCS offices until Aug. 31.
Rahm alluded back to the 2012 drought and how adverse the impact was for Missouri farmers.
He said the NCRS and other similar agencies want to help out farmers and livestock producers as much as possible.
“We know that a lot of the livestock producers were really having a tough time coming up with enough feed for their animals,” Rahm.
“This year, we wanted to do what we can to provide the most immediate assistance.” The NCRS emergency initiative comes on the heels of the U.S. Department of Agriculture Farm Service Agency enacting emergency haying and grazing in Randolph County.