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<br />If 1976-77 is dry following a lower quartile year <br />this year, the winter and spring dry farmed grain crop would <br />again be lost. Serious economic situations would develop <br />locally. <br /> <br />I <br />I <br />I <br />I <br />I <br />I <br />I <br />1 <br />I <br /> <br />Dry Farmed Areas - The 1.2 million acres (500,000 hectares) <br />of dry farmed grain a~d nearly 20 million acres (8,000,000 hec- <br />tares) of dry farmed rangeland areas in California have already <br />been hard hit by the lack of precipitation to date. These <br />areas lie in the foothills of the Sierra Nevada from Fresno to <br />Redding, along the upper and western portions of the Sacramento <br />Valley and in the higher elevation mountain valleys throughout <br />the northern part of the State, Minor amounts of dry farmed <br />land can be found elsewhere. <br /> <br />Grain - Winter grain, planted on ground that was fallowed <br />last spring to preserve soil moisture, is beginning to show <br />moisture stress. Grain, planted on land that was not fallowed, <br />has either failed to germinate due to lack of rain and to cool' <br />fall temperatures, or if it did germinate most was lost due to <br />lack of moisture to sustain growth, Soil moisture is at the <br />wilting point. Immediate rains could save some northern valley <br />grain. A continuation of lower quartile precipitation would <br />mean no dry farmed grain crop this year. Economic damage in <br />foothill counties would be serious. <br /> <br />Rangeland - Native pasture supports cattle and sheep <br />throughout the State. The lack of precipitation has caused <br />forage to be extremely low this year. Many springs and farm <br />ponds used for stock watering are dry, so that livestock can- <br />not make the best use of what little forage is available on the <br />range. This has resulted in cattle being marketed in large <br />numbers and thus lowering cattle market prices, Even some <br />breeding stock is being sent to slaughter where cost of supple- <br />mental feed is uneconomic. Supplemental feeding is being <br />carried out to sustain those not being marketed, Some sheep <br />operators in Kern County have already moved sheep to mountain <br />pasture. Some cattlemen are facing bankruptcy. <br /> <br />If rains are normal this spring, it would take 6to <br />8 weeks for forage to grow sufficiently to allow resumption of <br />grazing on natural pasture. Forage would then only be about <br />50% of normal and the cattle and sheep industry would sustain <br />considerable loss. Nutrient content as well as amount of <br />forage is and would be affected. <br /> <br />If spring rains should not come, losses in the cattle <br />and sheep industry could be monumental, in the hundreds of <br />million dollars. <br /> <br />A continuation of a dry next year would take a lesser <br />toll because the animal populations would already be severely <br />reduced. Those rem~ining would face the supplemental feeding <br />problem and economics of the individual operator would <br /> <br />-14- <br />