Changing Weather: How Does It Affect Farmers?
US - Marvin Hanger's family has operated this dairy farm just outside Barlow for 45 years. And Hanger's biggest challenge is with the dairy cows providing the milk and dairy products for the rest of us. Like most animals, they grow extra hair in the wintertime, which is great...but not when the weather turns unseasonably warm
21 December 2006
1 minute read
"When it warms up toward springtime, they start shedding their hair, and their coats," Hanger says. "So they're like us, taking off their coats when it gets warmer. And they can't do that in the winter when it warms up and gets cold again."
This is the last week Hanger will be operating his dairy farm. These cows, in fact, are headed out to a new farm in Michigan, where it will be a bit colder.
But it isn't just the cold weather that can affect them. A different temperature extreme, heat, can have dangerous affects on farm animals. They're just as vulnerable to extreme temperatures, like those of this past summer, as we are.
"They talked about, in California, the heat was in the 100's," Hanger recalls. "And there was a tremendous amount of cattle dying of heat stroke. And I knew some in the county lost some cattle. We didn't; we were lucky."
Source: WTAP News
