In the name of local journalism, I took my first-ever county crop tour last week.
Now, this is usually an event that Mike covers, but it ended up on my plate this time.
And, alright, it might not be my actual – first - but certainly the only “official” one that came with a few tour guides and more agriculture information than I’ll be able to retain long term.
Other crop tour experiences were done out of boredom, curiosity, and occasionally whenever my mom or grandmother needed me to go check their gardens outside.
So, you know, something small-scale rather than the absolute acreage I saw last week.
And, we were mostly lucky that the weather held off long enough for me to snap a picture or two and take some notes for this week’s story.
That being said, I have to admit a certain level of admiration for our farmers and by extension – our ranchers.
If neither of those are fields you’ve grown up with or otherwise taken an interest in, you probably don’t know how much work goes into them.
I think we all have some idea about what it costs to farm and ranch without depending on the type of crop or animal you choose.
I mean, at any given moment I see advertisements about farming equipment that costs twice as much as my car or more and how everyone is really at the mercy of Mother Nature and the weather.
Not to mention, farmers and ranchers have to maintain their licenses with continuing education classes and workshops.
And that doesn’t include fostering relationships with other farmers/ranchers, neighbors, veterinarians, local extension office agents, and more.
It’s definitely a career field that requires much more commitment than I initially expected!
To be completely honest, I think I’m going to stick with the whole backyard garden crops that I’m used to.
But, I also acknowledge that without our larger-scale farmers and ranchers that we’d definitely be in worse shape than we are now with inflation of goods.
At the Reddell homestead, we’re trying to keep our grocery costs down with mom’s garden, but the prospect of having to eat tomatoes at almost every meal isn’t working out so well.
We were also impacted by the storms earlier this month – they ended up knocking all of mom’s unripened bounty and flowers into the mud!
And a small part of me is glad that none of her squash plants seem to be producing any winners just yet.
It’ll be interesting to see what happens with this week’s influx of tropical rainy weather.
By Monday afternoon, forecasters are painting a picture of anywhere from 6-10 inches of rain with flooding possible throughout the Gulf Coast.
For us, that motivated mom and Mike to mow the lawn as short as possible and will likely mean our dogs won’t be wanting to do their business outdoors for the week either.
I urged her to check her garden before the rains came in, but I’m stuck in the office and have no idea what shape her garden is in at all.
Well, overall, I think it’s better that we have some rain now than going into a rumored summer drought season without a buffer.
After all, hurricane season doesn’t “officially” end until Nov. 30 and we all know that Mother Nature doesn’t care for our calendars by any means.
