Famine in America?

[Richard Myers]

Yes, in the footsteps of our Saviour.

[Mimi]

With extreme heat covering a large portion of America, many roads and bridges are buckling. Search "roads buckle heat" in your browser. The results are astounding.

[colporteur]

Naturally as the drought increases  as well as other natural disasters world wide there is talk of not enough food for the growing population. This could easily be solved. It takes 7 lbs. of grain to produce 1 pound of beef, not to mention all the water. I don't know what the world's intake on beef is but let's say it is 15% of the total food intake. If the raising of beef were to stop and if my math is correct, that one alteration alone would double the quantity of food in the world. Perhaps 15% is high but we could add other animals that consume grain such as swine chickens, turkeys, and fish.  Think of the water that would be saved.

I don't remember what % of beef on the hoof is actually edible but if 1/3 of a 1500 lb. steer is food that means that this one animal has consumed 3500 pounds of grain. That's roughly 70 bushels of grain. At a pound of food per person that would feed 3500 people for a day. Bovine also eat vegetation some of which could be used for food if necessary

[Mimi]

Very true, Colporteur. On a different note, sorghum is replacing many failed corn crops. It requires much less water.  From Wiki:

... an important world crop, used for food (as grain and in sorghum syrup or "sorghum molasses"), fodder, the production of alcoholic beverages, and biofuels. Most varieties are drought- and heat-tolerant, and are especially important in arid regions, where the grain is one of the staples for poor and rural people.

This was on national news the other day and those farmers switching to a sorghum crop are enjoying pre-sales of their entire harvest.

[colporteur]

My wife recently attended an NRCS meeting. The speaker and soil expert said that they expect the drought to last 3 years or more. He said that the farmers have caused the drought over the years by continually depleting the soil of organic matter and therefore causing an increase in soil temperature. He said that organic matter in the soil and cover crops cool the soil as well as holding the moisture. Thr speaker said that countries that follow the US model of intensive farming  are experiencing the same thing but this can be reversed by rotating row crops with cover crops like alfalfa but it needs to be done now.

Not sure why but I have had the impression since this spring that the drought could likely last 3 1/2 years. Maybe something of biblical proportions is happening here.

[Richard Myers]

While these practices can help, it does not change the fact that there has been little rain.  It is nice to blame man when in fact there are things going on in nature that has nothing to do with man, except that he has forsaken his God.  As we get further into this, we shall hear from the professing Christian world that God is unhappy with America because we have forsaken him as a nation. Just look at the Democratic Parties resistance to mentioning God in their platform just voted.  It is true that God has begun to remove His hand of protection from America and it is true that 9/11 and other disasters are the result. We shall see more and more disasters of an increasing magnitude. But, it is not God that is causing these, it is God who has removed His protecting hand from those who do not love Him and keep His commandments.

Fires, floods, tornadoes, earthquakes, tsunamis, pestilence, and famine are in the land and will continue to increase world-wide. The Bible is a sure Word in a world soon to perish. As the world was at the time of Noah, so it is today just before the soon return of Jesus. Good is called evil and evil is called good. "Judgment is turned away backward, and justice standeth afar off: for truth is fallen in the street, and equity cannot enter.  Yea, truth faileth; and he that departeth from evil maketh himself a prey: and the LORD saw it, and it displeased him that there was no judgment." Isaiah 59:14,15. 

[Marelis]

A lack of rain certainly doesn't help, but farming techniques haven't helped. I've lived through years of serious drought and it is frightening, even for Christians. The landscape is an eerie greyish blonde, the sky hazy, sheep are skinny.  Where I am we are entering another drought. Make it a serious and nationwide drought and we can imagine the implications.

[colporteur]

A large part of the reason it is not raining is because with that much heat in the ground and in the air the condensation factor is not present. It takes warm and cool to being rain. When you have so much heat in the air the moist air masses are pushed to the side of the heat mass. He showed how this happens in the Sahara desert. The heat pushes the moist air masses around the peremiter of the desert. This is largely what has been happening in the US. Anyway, this was the speaker's explanation. Heat and drought usually go hand in hand.

 We have seen this in our state week after week and month after month. Nearly every week there has been at least one day where 60% chance of rain was forecast. Most of these weeks there was not so much as a dew and only on ocassion was there even a light sprinkle. We cannot deny that man is largely bringing upon himself all of his problems.

[Marelis]

You make some good points, Colporteur.  I don't know if you have lived in severe drought but it is not difficult to imagine water rations. Not allowed to flush the toilet....

[Cop]

It seems to be almost a sin that so much corn is being used to make ethenol instead of being used for food stuffs. The U.S. is now purchasing corn from other nations...primarily Brazil.

Fed law requires 40% of all the U.S. corn harvest is to be converted to ethenol.  Does this make sense???

[Richard Myers]

Not when it takes so much energy to produce the corn, then the ethanol. If we could produce a vegetation that took less energy to turn into gas, that would be good. But, now it would be better to use the oil that we have to get us out of the economic mess we are in.

[JimB]

The nation's worst drought in decades is expected to persist and likely intensify across much of the drought-stricken parts of the Plains, Southwest and Rockies over the next several months, federal scientists announced Thursday. Source

[JimB]

Texas farmers talking Dust Bowl

It's scary to think the Dust Bowl of the 1930s, with its relentless drought and wind that ravaged millions of acres in West Texas, could return.

But there are some worrisome  signs, according to the Texas A&M AgriLife Extension Service.

Reports this week from county agents in the Panhandle, South Plains and Rolling Plains indicate farmers and ranchers are working with "very difficult" conditions, according to a news release. Source

[Cop]

Several times this year we have had dust from the storms in the Panhandle reach all the way down here in Southeast Texas. This drought we've had for the last ten years or so is like the one Texas had back in the 50's. The first 10 years of my life were spent in this drought and I thought it was normal. After it ended, Texas began building reservoirs across the state in the 60's, 70's & 80's. Now most of them are way below capacity or dry and the population has quadrupled since the 50's. The experts say that while the droughts of the 30's and 50's were worse, but we now have too many people here for what water we have. There is a growing sense among even the worldly that the earth is wearing out and there is worse to come.

While we have had a wetter winter this year than the past years, we are still below 'normal' in rainfall. We're praying that we will have a better crop this year.

[JimB]

Apparently the good Lord has seen fit to give the nation a good amount of rain this spring. As someone who dreams of hiking out west someday in the "real" mountains I see the snowpack for the Sierras is 185% above normal and that's not the only mountain range to have a much larger snowfall this year.

This part of the country is not exception either as all 5 of the Great Lakes are much higher than average and couple make break records.

Lake Erie's water levels are the highest they've been since 1998, and will remain 4 to 9 inches above normal through November.

The latest reading measured just 7.32 inches below the all-time record high set in 1986. Within the next week, the level could increase to just 6 inches below that record. Source

[Richard Myers]

Global warming?

[Wally]

I thought global warming was supposed to produce widespread drought.  Maybe the prophets of global warming doom forgot that warmer weather causes more evaporation.  The atmosphere can hold only so much moisture before it precipitates somewhere.

[colporteur]

I though global warming was supposed to produce widespread drought.  Maybe the prophets of global warming doom forgot that warmer weather causes more evaporation.  The atmosphere can hold only so much moisture before it precipitates somewhere.

It is interesting that the prophet said to build on high ground in the last days. That does not sound like drought to me.