Is it hot enough for you?
For Island farmers the answer seems to be yes as the recent heat wave trumped concern about Hurricane Earl.
P.E.I. Federation of Agriculture executive director John Jamieson said a lot farmers have been out harvesting their crops this week, but it was because of the high temperatures, not the impending storm.
“I think guys are harvesting anyway because of the weather.”
Summerside set a new record for Sept. 1 at 32.7 C and on Sept. 2 climbed to 33.2 C to set a new record for a second day while Charlottetown fell just short of a record Wednesday and beat the capital’s Sept. 2 record by reaching 30.8 C.
Jamieson said the high temperatures have been hard on crops like cabbage that has been too hot to harvest and on livestock, which has lead to reduced production from dairy cows.
“They don’t like this heat.”
But cabbage isn’t the only crop affected by the heat and rain from the hurricane could actually help potato farmers, he said.
“Potatoes are getting pretty dry so a bit of rain will actually be welcome.”
When contacted Friday Jamieson said it didn’t look like there would be a huge amount of rain this weekend and farmers weren’t harvesting because of it.
“Basically, farmers are doing what they do anyway.”
But Jamieson said the weather is hard to predict and farmers don’t have a lot of options when it comes dealing with the weather.
“There’s only so much you can do with your crops to protect them.”
While some crops have already been harvested, there is some wheat and oats still out that could be affected if winds are strong enough, he said.
“Grain crops can be flattened.”
He also said too much rain can be bad for potatoes, but he doesn’t expect that to be a problem with Earl.
“They’re fairly well along in their growth.”
This year has seen a good apple crop on P.E.I., but the hurricane could blow some of them off the trees or even break branches, he said.
“You may lose some production because the apples fall off.”
Jamieson said even if the hurricane does damage crops a lot of farmers have crop insurance, which would cover loss from extreme weather.
“They do have some protection there.”
rross@theguardian.pe.ca
