I just came in from the fields...
Yes, our actions have changed our climate. It is getting to be a real challenge to farm these days. Just last year we were in a 2 year drought. Fires blazed all over CA and ash rained down from the skies like Pompeii. Crops suffered.
This year we were hit with so much rain we couldn't get into the fields 'til mid May. Then it was so cold (avg 66 degrees) and damp nothing wants to grow. What does grow is plagued with fungus/blights and must be destroyed.
BUT wait...now the last 4 days we have had 100 degree temps....even reaching 104 yesterday! The poor plants can't adapt quick enough, but it has sent a signal out for the sleeping grasshoppers to hatch! I've never seen so many in my life. They move in clouds as you walk through the fields devouring everything! I'm baffled by it all. I've never faced so many challenges as a farmer. A few are hard enough, but what is happening is terrifying.
If you think we haven't altered our planet's delicate weather balance, then I'm here to tell you as a farmer YOU ARE WRONG! The challenges that lie ahead for humanity to feed itself will be many.
I take responsibility for my share of this crisis. I've contributed by driving, using fossil fuels and other things we now know cause so much damage. I try my best to educate others. I do my best to leave a small carbon footprint now, but I'm afraid its too late. I'm afraid its too late because as a farmer I see what is happening to the earth. I'm so much closer to it than most. My life is intertwined with it, and so it is for all others. They just don't realize it. So the pattern seems to go on. We have to stop what we are doing to this planet. We have to begin to heal it and then I'm afraid it will take generations to undo what this one has done.
I get carried away, but if you could see what I see happening in the fields you would be as afraid as I am. I must go battle the grasshoppers...
