You can see just a little different attitude among local farmers after a pretty good rainfall came on Saturday night. Most areas reported anywhere from .8 to just over 2 inches of rain in that system. The rainfall has continued off and on since Saturday evening and looks to possibly continue a day or two more.

This, on top of the last rainfall totals we had from the last system that came through, will bring our county rainfall total up to near 7 inches total on the average, which is near the total of 8.56 Terry County had all of last year. It definitely looks like a better crop year in the making.

Unfortunately, there was a little hail in this system. Glen and Kirk Martin both reported hail south of Wellman, but we have heard no reports of other areas of hail.

Kirk did state he had about 1.3 inches a few miles west of Brownfield. On further west, close to 2 inches was reported at Gomez. Barrett Brown who farms in the area stated, “This gives us an opportunity to have a crop this year, so that is what we are going to try to do,” stated Barrett.

Rhett Green stated, “I have had anywhere from 1.25 – 2.75 inches around my farms. I haven’t had any hail yet, so that is good. In a perfect world, we would like to space these rains out, but we will take whatever we can get.”

Ryan Dill reported .8 to 2 inches on his farms. “It creates an opportunity for us to rest our wells on our irrigated farms, but more importantly, it creates an opportunity to have a dryland crop. I like to base my decisions on looking at potential, and this rain has really increased the potential of my dryland acres.”

Mason Becker stated he had between 1.5 – 2 inches on his. “This rain came at just the right time. We were fortunate to get a dryland crop started, but with the heat last week, we were starting to see stress on those crops. This rain will give everything a good boost.”

Kirk stated, “This rain has been at the perfect time and has helped make the decision on whether or not to fertilize all the dryland. Things have sure turned around from eight weeks ago.”

Rhett told TownTalk Media, “This is just awesome. Everything is up and growing, especially the grass. I was getting into a bind on finding hay to help supplement the cattle. This rain has really kicked that grass off.”

Mason said, “We will just keep on going. We are a good ways out from making a crop, but it sure looks good right now. We will keep on praying for continued rain throughout the next few months and hopefully have a shot at a dryland crop this year, for the first time in a long time.”

Rhett concluded, “It is exciting to have this much moisture right now. We have a great start and cotton prices look to be decent right now. There is some speculation that cotton could reach close to a dollar a pound. Come December, if we can bring in a crop, that would help everyone in this community and the region. What most people don’t understand is all we need is help from God, and a decent price and we can compete with anyone in the world.”

And this help from God, in the form of rainfall, is just what the doctor ordered.

Pray for our farmers. They need a crop this year. Our local economy needs to see that crop. As the farmer goes, so goes the world.