Local farmers on the Eastern Shore are trying to beat the heat

The high temperatures have the crops cooking in the summer sun. Local Farmers say on the Eastern Shore they usually get a heat wave in the last week of June and first week of July, and are waiting for things to cool back down again. Gaylon Adkins is one of those farmers, and is the owner of Adkins Farm Market.  

“In this area here, there has been enough moisture to hold everything, but if it stays in the 90s for a week or two and we don’t get anymore rain, it’s gonna get critical.”

Adkins says their produce is grown with an irrigation system to combat the high summer temperatures because little rain during the summer is much less of a problem than high heat.

“You can’t control the heat,” Adkins said. “When it gets into the 90s and stays there that can hinder the product because we depend on the bees to pollinate and bees tend to get a little bit lazy if it gets hot.”

Worcester County Farmer Virgil Shockley says last week was the first good week of growth for corn and soybeans because night temperatures reached above sixty degrees. 

“You got the corn getting ready to tassel, it needs water. The soybeans are getting ready to bloom, they will need water.”

Shockley says the corn and soybean crops have adapted to the high temperatures during the summer, giving them the ability to survive and thrive during heat waves.

“It gets to a point of course where they will fail, but the genetics behind the two of them now is a lot better than it was 10 years ago.”

“The rain has been steady, hasn’t been too much, been just enough, and at the right time,” Shockley said. “We will see if mother nature still provides for us.”