Word: droughts
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...Great Heat Wave and Drought of 1980 abated slightly last week. Brief but welcome rain, ranging from a trace to a downpour, fell over the U.S. But the rains never came to central Texas, and for the past month, virtually no rain has fallen there, or in most of Oklahoma and parts of Arkansas and New Mexico. When the rains finally came down, so did temperatures that have been breaking records for weeks throughout the Midwest and South. In Dallas and Fort Worth two of the hardest-hit cities in the country, the temperature has hit 100° or more...
National weather experts did not know if last week's short respite in some areas meant a break in the nation's agony or only a temporary reprieve. By week's end the killing heat and drought had caused the death of more than 1,200 people by some estimates and cost farmers millions of dollars in lost crops and livestock...
Hardest hit by the high temperatures and drought were American farmers, who were suffering both physically and financially. Chicken farmers and cattle ranchers in the South and Southwest had the heaviest losses. Fragile broiler chickens may begin to die when temperatures rise above 80°, and egg production of laying hens declines above 90°. Mrs. Jean Cordle of Shelby County, Tenn., gave ice water to her chickens three times a day, but 25 of her 88 hens died, and their production fell from 30 dozen a week to 12 dozen. Livestock owners are taking their animals to market early...
Cattlemen in Kansas and Missouri are selling off their herds because of burnt pastures and a shortage of feed. Farther north, the Dakotas and eastern Montana have been enduring a drought for almost a year. In Montana, range lands were devastated, and crop losses were estimated at up to 90%. Worst off: winter and spring wheat, barley, oats...
...tragedy is in part the result of drought. For the past two years, the normally dependable rains that usually begin in March have arrived behind schedule-or not at all. This has disrupted planting from Somalia to Mozambique. In Kenya, a six-week delay in the rainy season contributed to a decline in milk production from 700,000 liters to 400,000 liters a day; milk, butter and baby formula virtually disappeared from, the stores...