Extreme weather in the Midwest and the demise of US agriculture - DENIAL all round

This has to be THE MOST important story for all Americans and also for the rest of us.

It is,however,the most overlooked story and is hardly given much more than passing coverage.

I have the feeling that those that monitor what I do don't want this to get out.

I have been covering things,albeit with constant attempts to break into my system while I have the VPN switched on. As I went to upload this I started to have "technical issues" with Blogger.As I went to another computer the "problems" immediately and "mysteriously" went away.

I have just received these comments from a friend, via email

"USDA is claiming corn planting is 3% ahead of last year in spite of all the flooding. This is Soviet era Pravda. Check out Accuweather news.

“Apparently there is going to be no warning of the inevitable crash.

“It can't be far away now. It seems they are terrified of upsetting the markets and all those derivatives. The weather should be even worse next year so I can't see it holding together until the end of 2020, likely sooner.”


I concur.

Crops Devastated As More Ferocious Storms Pound The Midwest – “It’s Hard To Get Your Head Around Just How Bad It Is”

Michael Snyder

 

End of the American Century,

26 June, 2019

It has gotten to the point where maybe we should just expect violent storms to hammer the Midwest every single day of the week.  Highly destructive storms ripped through the Midwest on Tuesday, it happened again on Wednesday, and the forecast calls for more powerful storms on Thursday.  This growing season has been a complete and utter nightmare for U.S. farmers, and each day it just gets even worse.  Millions of acres will not be planted at all this year, but an even bigger problem is that fact that crops are dramatically failing on tens of millions of acres that were actually planted in time.  Every major storm does even more damage, and that is why what we have witnessed so far this week has been so alarming.

For example, on Tuesday the middle of the country was absolutely pummeled by “more than 120 damaging storms”…

More than 120 damaging storms were reported from Montana all the way to Florida on Tuesday, a barrage that included 70 mph winds from Texas to Illinois, golf ball-sized hail Nebraska and up to half a foot of rain in parts of southern Iowa.

 

Then on Wednesday a series of severe storms dumped enormous amounts of rain “from Washington state to Illinois”.

And of course we aren’t done yet.  According to AccuWeather, Thursday will be another very rough day for the heartland…

More severe weather is likely on Thursday over parts of the North-Central states.

The storms may take a more west-to-east track across the northern Plains to the Great Lakes region during Thursday afternoon and night.

During this period, a complex of storms is likely to travel from the eastern part of South Dakota to across Lake Michigan and much of the Lower Peninsula of Michigan. Storms are forecast to roll through Minneapolis in the morning and then Milwaukee later in the day or evening.

In recent weeks, some people that clearly don’t live in the middle of the country have left some really negative comments on my articles about the enormous toll that this disaster is taking on Midwest farmers.  For whatever reason, some people want to try to minimize the nightmare that these farmers are living.  But the truth is that it would be very difficult to overstate the scope of this crisis at this point.

Recently, Missouri farmer Kate Glastetter told one reporter that her fields “are washing away” and that they currently resemble “lakefront property”…

Kate Glastetter has worked on her family farm all her life. Alongside her father, the 25-year-old farmer grows row crops—wheat, bean, and corn—and runs a cow and calf operation in Scott County, Missouri. Normally, at this time in the season, farmers would be starting to plant soybeans, and corn should already be in the ground. Instead, Glastetter says, their fields are covered in water. “It’s like lakefront property,” she says. “The fields are washing away.”

It’s a common story across the Midwest and Great Plains, where the Missouri and Mississippi River basins are still recovering from a catastrophic deluge: Since March, record flooding in the central United States has caused historic crop delays. The Mississippi River received levels of rain and snow at 200 percent above normal this spring, causing corn and some soybean farmers to wait longer to plant their crops than ever recorded in Department of Agriculture data.

How would you feel if you had to watch your income for the year literally wash away right in front of your eyes?

This is happening in state after state, and it is truly a disaster unlike anything we have ever seen before.  In fact, one agricultural expert told AgWeb that it is “hard to get your head around just how bad it is”…

“I never thought we’d see this widespread of a weather issue — all the way from South Dakota to Ohio,” Jerry Gulke, president of the Gulke Group, told Farm Journal’s AgWeb.

“It’s hard to get your head around just how bad it is.”

Meanwhile, U.S. farmers are also being absolutely devastated by our trade war with China.  The following comes from Zero Hedge…

The Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Affairs of the People’s Republic of China published new data Monday that shows agricultural imports from the US have fallen, as Chinese buyers shift supply chains out of the US to other countries because of the deepening trade war.

In the first five months of 2019, imports of agricultural products from the US crashed 55.3% YoY. Much of decline was due to a 70.6% YoY decline of soybeans in the same period.

Chinese importers went to Brazil, Argentina, and ASEN countries (Thailand, Indonesia, Malaysia, Singapore, Philippines, Vietnam, Brunei, Myanmar (Burma), Cambodia, and Laos). Data showed imports from the EU, Australia, and Canada also jumped in the first five months as Chinese buyers ditched American products.

Farmers are being financially destroyed all over the country, and yet there are some people out there that seem to think that it is appropriate to mock them and make light of their suffering.

I just don’t get it.

Look, the truth is that we are all going to be hurting as a result of this crisis.  Food prices are going to go up, gas prices are going to go up as less corn is available for ethanol, and the massive income loss that U.S. farmers are suffering is going to have ripple effects throughout the entire U.S. economy.  Those that are mocking others should be busy preparing for harder times instead.

And of course this all comes at a time when we are experiencing the worst economic downturn since the last recession.

For many months, I warned that a “perfect storm” was coming, and now we can see evidence of it all around us.

For U.S. farmers, it is hard to imagine that things could get even worse than they are right now, and so let us hope that better weather is right around the corner.

 

This winter’s flooding in the Midwest could herald the beginning of the end for the United States

Don't mention the elephant in the room!

The Possible End of the United States

This winter’s flooding in the Midwest could herald the beginning of the end for this country. Barring some miracle, this flooding has given such a hit that the country may never recover.

Ira Lee White

Medium,
29 March, 2019

The Impact on People


When a person has been through a flood, it takes a toll mentally that can take years to overcome. The number of issues one has to deal with can be overwhelming. One’s home has just been made unlivable. Personal items and items needed on a daily basis are all destroyed and the mess has to be cleaned up. Your employment and cash flow is interrupted. With most Americans unable to take care of an emergency costing $500, this will be devastating. The Salvation Army and the Red Cross will be there but due to the scope of the disaster, their services will be overwhelmed. FEMA has suffered cutbacks and will be unable to respond in a meaningful way.


People will not have their heads wrapped around the problem but will somehow have to find safe shelter, potable water, food, and medical care for themselves and their families. The full impact of what has happened will not hit them until sometime later. In addition, there is more rain forecast and there will be the snow melt to deal with as well. This combination creates a pressure cooker sort of reaction in the brains of the people going through this. They have just seen the destruction of what took them years to build and there is no end in sight. This is a huge psychological hit that will inflict poor communities more than the rich who will have the mobility and the money to move away. In any case, the mental health, as well as the physical health of the people directly affected, will be a cause for great concern over the next couple of years.


The Impact on Animals


Thousands of animals, both domestic and wild, have died. The cost of dealing with their corpses will be expensive. The loss of food animals will also be expensive as it will take time to replace them. In addition, much of the animal food is grown in the Midwest and with this taken out, there will be shortages of food for domestic animals. Prices will eventually rise and the number of breeding animals will be reduced so that future numbers will be much smaller than we are used to.


The price of every kind of animal food, including dog food much of which has corn and wheat in it, will rise. This will translate to higher costs in everything from the cost of keeping your pet to the cost of meat and cereals. In the meantime, due to the post-flood conditions, disease will be rampant and more animals will die and will not be available for food. The end result will be the decimation of our cheap meat and cereal food supply. This will impact poor communities all over the nation and will to some degree end our ability to prop up our economy with grain exports.


Meanwhile, in the natural world, disease will be rampant. A temporary rise in predators and scavengers will arise only to crash once the availability of easy prey and carcasses disappear. This will be followed by waves of other imbalances as Nature tries to right herself. It will take years.


The Impact on the Environment


When a flood washes through an area, the water picks up and stirs up all sorts of things. Septic tanks overflow, sewer lines are inundated, water flowing through garages, across roads, parking lots and through businesses that use or handle toxic chemicals will be contaminated with these substances. A toxic soup of chemicals and dangerous bacteria covers the land. Imagine how much contamination is in the Midwest right now with thousands of acres of land under water. In addition to this, the mosquito season will be lengthened heightening the opportunities for the spread of disease.


This is only the beginning. Flood waters have inundated toxic Superfund sites, some containing radioactive materials. This contamination is now spread across vast areas. The run-off from homes and businesses is contamination on a scale that is massive enough. The run-off from these toxic Superfund sites will add so much contamination to this that it will be off the scale. In addition, it has been estimated that over 1 million private wells have been contaminated and who knows how many urban centers have had their water supply impacted. It will take years to clean this up if it is at all possible. Where will people and animals get their water in the meantime? How will anyone be able to even grow a garden if the water used to keep it alive is toxic as is the ground where it grows?


The Impact on Infrastructure


Our infrastructure is already crumbling. But now roads are washed away or covered with thick mud, dams have breached, bridges have been washed out or damaged. The addition of the flood waters from the spring melt will add billions on to the cost of fixing it. Electrical grids, water systems, sewage systems, roads, railroads, bridges, dams, and power plants will have to be repaired or replaced.


Homes that have been flooded will have to be torn down. Sheetrock sucks up water so that if a foot of water gets in the house, the toxic water will be sucked up to a height of perhaps four feet or more depending on the length of time water is in the house. Toxic mold will proliferate. Wood will rot, cement will crack and all items in the house including appliances and furniture will have to be disposed of. The people living there will lose most of what they had. They will need changes of clothes, soap, toothbrushes, OTC medications and a host of other things including a place to stay. They will most likely not be able to return to their homes for a very long time if at all.


The Impact on the Economy


The cost of clean-up and rebuilding will be immense and will take years. I read a report that estimated the cost to be at least $3 billion. In my opinion, this is quite small in comparison to the actual cost which will only be realized in time. It has been estimated that in Nebraska, 2,000 or more homes have been damaged or destroyed. It cost my family $40,000 dollars to renovate our home after two feet of water entered it in 2001. Repairs will not be this cheap at this time and full replacement will be very high depending on the size of the home. If we take a mean cost of replacing or repairing these homes, at today’s cost it could run as high as $100,000 average. This times 2,000 comes out to $200 million in Nebraska alone and this does not take into account the spring run-off which will start shortly and wreak more havoc. In addition, Nebraska lost 340 businesses. I haven’t any idea how much it will cost to replace them but it will be massive. Nebraska estimates business losses at $85 million and infrastructure at $449 million.


Crops have been lost and animals have died as well. The estimates for this are also quite low as they do not take into account the long term effects which will include higher consumer prices and loss of exports which will, in turn, result in more borrowing by the Federal and State governments with interest. Nor do they take into account the money needed to clean up the carcasses to prevent a public health crisis. Nebraska has estimated that there has been a loss of $400 million in animals and $450 million in crops. The loss will continue. For some time the land will not be fit for growing or grazing anything. Removing the mud cake that will cover the land and bake hard in the hot summer sun will not be cheap. Keep in mind, this is just Nebraska. North Dakota, South Dakota, Minnesota, Wisconsin, Iowa, Illinois, and Missouri have all been greatly impacted with some of the flooding also impacting the Border States. In any case, the state of Nebraska estimates its current losses at $1.3 billion and the spring melt hasn’t begun yet.


In addition to the lost wages, lost business due to closure or destruction, there will be ongoing losses to government income and business taxes, sales of luxury goods, even sales of necessities. Exports will be affected in both the long and short term. The amount of rebuilding that will be needed will raise the price of materials to go along with the rise in food prices. The cleanup of radiation and toxic chemicals, if done properly, will add another fortune to the overall expense. Medical costs, both for physical and mental health which are difficult to estimate but guaranteed to be expensive, will be added in. Insurance premiums for business and homeowners will go up to cover the companies’ losses. The costs will ripple out through the economy causing loss of discretionary income which will result in losses not directly related to the flooding.


Who will pay for all this? We are already running a historic deficit on the federal level. FEMA does not have a great track record and with Trump at the helm, he will be even more useless now than he has been for the last disaster. Besides, when the cost keeps going up and the time for recovery gets longer, will Trump do like he is now doing with hurricane aid to another group of American citizens, the Puerto Ricans, and call for stopping aid because it is taking too much money and too long to complete? You can bet his money making trips to Mar a Largo will not cease nor will he chip in by donating his salary as president. Congress, as it is now constituted, will make a show of providing aid but it won’t be enough. They have regimes to change and wars to finance. The rich will chip in only as much as it favors them. Many state governments are already struggling. Almost one-third of the population of the US has been or will be affected before the spring runoff ends. Those folks will not have much to contribute to their own disaster. Insurance companies will chisel their way through this providing as little as possible to those who even have insurance. Some companies may even face bankruptcy. Some of the crops and animals will be insured by the Federal Government but the sheer mass of the loss will put a strain on the system.


People all over the country are already living hand to mouth. Most cannot even afford a $400 emergency. The economic strain put on this country by the flooding, the flooding to come and any other disasters we will encounter in this coming year will put a lot of stress on this country and its leadership. Perhaps the title of this piece is a little hyperbolic, but I do believe we are in for some very rough times, especially if we get hit with another disaster on top of this one.

A synchronized worldwide drought.would be a colossal killer

The Great Drought

by ROBERT HUNZIKER

Counterpunch,

26 October, 2018

The most hazardous global warming risk for society at large is widespread loss of grain production because of a synchronized worldwide drought. It would be a colossal killer. It’s happened before, known as The Great Drought 142 years ago.

Unmistakably, droughts feed off global warming and world temps are heading up, not down. Thus, droughts are intensified by temperature increases. If the same conditions as the drought of 1876 recurs, it would likely be a nightmarish scenario.

Fortuitously, ever since The Great Drought of 142 years ago, droughts have been regional, e.g., when Russia experienced wheat shortages in 2011 as a result of extreme drought, which led to the Arab Spring, other countries like Brazil and the U.S. picked up the slack. The world continued spinning!

But, what if a severe drought hits the planet once again on a global basis like The Great Drought of the late 19th century? Then, what happens?

World population was only 1.4 billion when The Great Drought of 1876-78 killed 5.5 million in India alone, 50 million worldwide, but today’s world population is 4.5xs larger. Does this mean that global famine redux would bring in its wake 225 million deaths, or more? (Source: Researchers Say an 1800s Global Famine Could Happen Again, State of the Planet, Earth Institute/Columbia University, Oct. 12, 2018)

Answer: First, hit the big red button that bonks the clarion bell in the public square to awaken people to the fact that the human footprint, in part and increasingly, negatively influences climate change for the first time since Adam & Eve. Given enough time, anthropogenic global warming itself will hit the drought hot-stuff button. That’s one reason for nations of the world to commit to omitting fossil fuels, which emit CO2, which blankets the upper atmosphere, retaining way too much heat. It’s called “global warming.”

The Great Drought of 1876-78 has been thoroughly studied for the first time ever by Deepti Singh, et al, Climate and the Global Famine of 1876-78. Journal of Climate, 2018; DOI: 10.1175/JCLI-D-18-0159.1

The Great Drought and Global Famine of 1876 originated from natural variability or nature taking its own course. Hands down, it remains to this day one of the worst human disasters of all time with 50,000,000 dead. Killed by the forces of nature alone!

Singh’s study is the first-ever global-scale analysis of climatic conditions of 1876 utilizing multiple sources of data, including rain gauges and tree-ring drought atlases that go back in time 800 years, as well as multiple datasets of past climatic conditions.

Based upon the facts as presented by their comprehensive study, a recurrence of The Great Drought initiated by natural variability as prompted via an El Niño event in 1876-78 in today’s world would likely turn into an ultra nasty turbo-charged affaire, as anthropogenic global warming jumpstarts drought into a hyper-speed mode.

Recall, anthropogenic global warming was minimal in 1876. Whereas today’s rampant anthropogenic effect superimposed on a repeat of 1876 drought conditions is a disaster waiting to happen, as bad as it gets.

The Great Drought of the 19th century extended from Egypt to Australia, southwestern and eastern North America, Brazil, India, and China with Asia’s drought the worst in 800 years. In a word, it was worldwide. And, it was enormously deadly.

“Understanding the drought’s driving forces is important, says Singh, since they could strike again at any time—perhaps worse than ever, since hotter temperatures make droughts more intense,” (Causes of the Great Famine, One of the Deadliest Environmental Disasters, American Geophysical Union Fall Meeting, 12-15-17, Earth Institute, Columbia University)

Already, drought conditions around the world are starting to resemble something much more perilous than the regional drought events over the past century, which have always been offset by other crop-growing regions not in drought, to wit:

According to Drought.gov, as of October 16, 2018, in the United States, drought conditions currently impact 46 million people and 20% of the land area. One-half of the impacted people live in California, which also happens to be the nation’s largest producer of nuts, vegetables, and fruit.

The entire Southwest is suffering from aberrant drought conditions, meaning severe drought, adversely impacting the Colorado River Basin, key to major population centers, as well as irrigation for crops that feed America. As a result, it’s possible that Phoenix may be forced to ration water sometime in the near future. Colorado River flow is down 40%.

According to the U.S. Bureau of Reclamation, as of August 2018, the Lake Mead reservoir is only “5 feet above the shortage threshold.” Five feet lower and cutbacks will be necessitated by 2020 (If this one fact alone doesn’t cause Bureau officials to shake in their boots, then nothing will).

The snow that falls in the Rocky Mountains provides the majority of the water for the Colorado River. But, warming temperatures, altered hydrology patterns, misuse, and drought have diminished the water source. This is one prime example of global warming at work.

Argentina, one of the world’s top exporters of soy and corn, experienced its worst drought in decades in early/mid 2018 accompanied by steep decline in exports of grains hammering its economy as losses in grain exports amount to $3.4B. But, as of October ‘18, it’s anticipated grain crops will rebound. (Source: TheWatchers.news, Sept. 2018)

The 2015 Brazilian drought is still ongoing and considered the worst in 80 years, causing sp0radic water cutoffs to residents of São Paulo (pop. 32 million), another scenario that “shakes officials down to their boots.”

Most shocking of all, the Amazon Rainforest has experienced three 100-yr droughts in the space of just 10 years! That’s mind-boggling beyond all belief, never happened before, and seriously disruptive to hydrology flow throughout the world, which negatively impacts precipitation patterns as far away as America’s grain belt. Another “shake down to their boots” scenario.

The European Association of Fruit and Vegetable Processors claim growing conditions in early/mid 2018 were the most challenging in 40 years because of drought conditions. Some vegetable products were hit by 50% drop-offs. (Source: TheWatchers.news, Aug. 8, 2018).

Headlines throughout Europe mid 2018 claimed crop failures threatened farmers with bankruptcy with states of emergency declared in Latvia and Lithuania. Severe crop failures experienced in Sweden. Similar problems occurred in the Netherlands, Poland, Belarus and the Czech Republic.

In the Far East, Inner Mongolia’s northeastern and eastern areas suffered its worst drought on record as 120,000 people and 500,000 livestock were clobbered by severe water shortages. Temps registered 1°C (1.8 °F) higher than the same period in years past; thus, drying out ground moisture. (Source: TheWatchers.news, June 28, 2018)

In Afghanistan, 23-30% of water sources have gone dry, completely gone! No more water! Malnutrition is rampant across the county, thereby impacting 1.6 million children. The government has established drought emergency forces. Entire communities have relocated. These are “eco migrants,” a term that’s destined to achieve universal usage over time. (Source: TheWatchers.news, April 2018)

In Australia 30,000 Muslim worshippers came together for Eid al-Adha in harmony with farmers to pray for an end to what’s being called “the worst drought in living memory.” PM Turnbull declared the entire country “a land of drought.” (Source BBC news, Aug. 2018).

According to the UN, because of severe drought, about five million people in northern Senegal, southern Mauritania and parts of Mali, Niger, Burkina Faso and Chad, will require food and livelihood assistance, after having exhausted their food reserves.

Overall, drought conditions across the world are greater than the 1901-2017 average, meaning more land mass than normal subject to droughts. However, and thankfully, conditions are not at extreme critical levels… not yet!

According to David Miskus, drought expert for the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA), more than lack of precipitation and high temps influence droughts. Droughts are amplified by overuse and overpopulation of land.

In that regard, ever since The Great Drought of 1876, landmass is being overused and overpopulated to an extreme, bringing in its wake considerably higher risks of deepening worldwide droughts. As global warming heats up year-by-year, it’s only a matter of time before large portions of the planet become drought impaired, morphing into the dreaded super drought.

All-in, global warming is an enormously risky anthropogenic event that must be confronted by well-grounded, serious-minded leadership behind a Marshall Plan-type effort to go to renewable energy sources. Otherwise, at some point in time it will be lights out for sufficient agricultural crop production.

But ill-advised and shortsighted leadership in America, which is the second largest CO2 emitter in the world, doesn’t see it that way. Ergo, America’s a bigger threat to world stability than the combined forces of worldwide terrorists groups. Hands down, it’s no contest.

Postscript: “God has cared for these trees, saved them from drought, disease, avalanches, and a thousand tempests and floods. But he cannot save them from fools.” John Muir (1838-1914), Father of the National Parks.

Warnings of crop failure throughout the world

"Nobody's Prepared For This..."

This person ascribes all this to a solar minimum and an “approaching Ice Age”...but for all that it is a good round-up. Very few are joining the dots.

Farmers across northern and central Europe are facing crop failure and bankruptcy as one of the most intense regional droughts in recent memory strengthens its grip.

States of emergency have been declared in Latvia and Lithuania, while the sun continues to bake Swedish fields that have received only 12% of their normal rainfall.

The abnormally hot temperatures – which have topped 30C in the Arctic Circle – are in line with climate change trends, according to the World Meteorological Organization. And as about 50 wildfires rage across Sweden, no respite from the heatwave is yet in sight.

https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2018/jul/20/crop-failure-and-bankruptcy-threaten-farmers-as-drought-grips-europe

Luke: Finland set to have its lowest grain harvest of the 21st century

Finland is set to have its lowest grain harvest of the millennium and third consecutive year of poor grain harvest in 2018, according to the Natural Resources Institute Finland (Luke).

The extended period of dry and hot weather is set to have a considerable impact on grain yields in Finland, reports the Natural Resources Institute Finland (Luke).

Luke on Friday revealed it expects the annual grain harvest to be approximately 2.8 billion kilos, lower than ever before since the turn of the millennium and a third lower than the highest harvest of the millennium in 2009.

Russia

Japan

Australia

 

In a nutshell

 

The worst drought in Australian history is in WINTER!!

Australia's worst drought in history is in WINTER!!

The el-Nino has not arrived. Have you grasped the significance?

Current drought the worst in centuries as cost of feed sends farmers broke

RECORDS show the current crisis being faced by devastated farmers is unprecedented. This is why

News.com.au,

3 August, 2018

FARMERS are telling us it’s the worst drought they’ve experienced in their lifetime — and that’s just the start of it.

Scientific analysis of Australia’s drought extremes has shown the current crisis is likely to be the worst in 400 years.

Researchers recently reconstructed 800 years of seasonal rainfall patterns across the Australian continent and while 99 per cent of NSW is currently drought-stricken, the study also found that at the other end of the extreme, parts of Northern Australia are wetter than ever before.

The University of Melbourne team looked at historical records dating back to the 1700s but more detailed descriptions are provided in observational records when systematic recording of weather in Australia started in the late 19th century.

The most well known of these are the Federation drought (1895-1903), the World War II drought (1939-45), and the recent Millennium drought (1997-2009), as reported in The Conversation.

“For example, the Millennium drought, which was most severe in southwestern and southeastern Australia, was caused by poor rainfall during the cool season,” they wrote.

“In contrast, the Federation drought, which affected almost the entire continent, was predominantly due to rainfall declines during the warm season.

“We found that recent shifts in rainfall variability are either unprecedented or very rare over the reconstructed period. The two most striking patterns were in tropical Northern Australia, which as been unusually wet over the past century, and southern Australia, which has been unusually dry.”

The researchers point out the Millennium drought was larger in area and longer, while those of the 17th and 18th centuries were limited to specific regions.

Australia’s drought crisis: This is how you can help

This Bureau of Meteorology weather map shows rainfall levels for the southern wet season from April 1 to July 31 this year. Picture: BOMSource:Supplied

By comparison, this one shows a similar period, from March 1 to July 31 last year, highlighting how much worse the situation is. Picture: BOMSource:Supplied

Drought graph showing patterns over centuries. Picture: The ConversationSource:Supplied

Farmers have said this drought is the worst they’ve faced financially.

Some have reported churning through $1 million in a year just trying to feed their livestock.

Buy a Bale founder Charles Alder said a trailer of hay alone costs about $2500 and with transport costs as high as $5000 to get a supply to a property, feeding animals was a costly exercise.

Trailers can have between 40 and 60 hay bales on them and one trailer goes to just one farmer because the resource is so desperately needed.

Properties are too dry to produce any feed of their own and livestock are so starving farmers have been forced to shoot thousands of animals to put them out of their misery.

Mr Alder, who started the hay charity in 2013, has been inundated with requests from desperate farmers across the country.

Where they were once sending five trucks a week, they now transport anywhere up to 15.

Their waiting list is 850 farmers long and Mr Alder said sadly if they delivered a trailer to someone one month, they would only be calling again a month later.

The program asks Aussies to lend a hand by donating towards something that can make a difference to farmers — $4.40 pays for diesel to transport hay 1km, $100 worth of hay feeds one cow for one week, and $250 delivers 11,500 litres of water to a farm within 100km of the collection point.

For even more hay, $9500 buys a semi-trailer load and transports it to an affected area up to 900km.

“It’s an expensive business to be in,” Mr Alder said. “There’s a distinct lack of hay at the moment. It’s never-ending really, which is challenging.

“If we give them a truckload this month they’ll come back next month and need another so that’s pretty tough.”

Coral Jerry, 80, on the family farm ‘Marlborough’, 40km outside Coonabarabran. She is currently raising 40 orphaned lambs, feeding them 4-5 times a day. Picture: Brook Mitchell/Getty ImagesSource:Getty Images

Mr Alder said they had 11,000 farmers on their database.

“It’s just gone berserk,” he said. “It’s frustrating we have drought in Australia when we’re such a lucky country with so many assets, it’s a pity we have these challenges.”

Earlier this year, NSW dairy farmer John Fairley took to Facebook to ask the local community for help feeding his 130 cows and calves through the winter.

Usually the Fairley family, who run Country Valley in Picton, would grow their own crops to feed their cows but back in May, as a result of the drought over the three months prior, their grain only had about 10cm.

Every two weeks they were ordering 25 tonnes of hay to feed their animals at the cost of a whopping $9000 each trip and buying extra grain, costing another $9000 every six weeks.

Mr Fairley came up with the Adopt-A-Cow idea where Aussies could donate $1350 to adopt a cow or calf and help save the farm.

NSW has recorded the fifth-driest July on record with the dry spell marking the seventh consecutive month of below-average rainfall across the state.

The latest Bureau of Meteorology climate summary, released on Wednesday, found it was also the driest July since 2002 with many areas across the state recording the lowest July rainfall on record or the lowest amount for at least 20 years.

Queensland’s Department of Agriculture and Fisheries estimates 57 per cent of that state is in drought.