SEATTLE – In the long rain shadow of the Cascade Mountains, where dryland wheat farmers have eked out livings for more than a century, climate change is very much an issue of the present.

The rain gauge is always in the back of the mind for Mike Nichols, a wheat farmer cultivating 20,0000 acres across two counties in south-central Washington state.

It has to be:  Nichols doesn't irrigate, and with less than six inches of precipitation a year, his wheat crop is already on the edge of what's considered possible for dryland farming. When drought hits or if, as expected, the West gets drier, his operation will be in trouble.

"The last eight years have been pretty good," said Nichols. "But we are putting some [cash] aside, because down the line we know we're going to go through another drought."

Although Nichols remains stoic about the potential that climate change could eventually have on his livelihood, his innovative dryland farming methods enable his crops to better handle low moisture conditions. 

But there are legions of farmers in the West and Midwest dependent on dwindling aquifers and over-subscribed rivers for irrigation. If today's drought conditions continue, a whole new generation of growers may join Nichols and return to wholly rain-fed farming.

To cope with Washington's aridity, Nichols crops on a rotating two-year period, leaving half his fields remaining fallow at any given time.  Partly as a result, Nichols currently averages 18 bushels an acre. The average in Washington – where most wheat farms are dryland – is closer to 53 bushels per acre.

Nichols and others like him continue to wring profits from their yields through the practice of extremely efficient farming, using no-tillage methods to preserve moisture and soil, while leaving at least half the ground fallow at any given time.

Such dryland farming practices represent an ever-evolving science; albeit, one that the rest of the country may increasingly heed.

Irrigation is increasingly seen as a non-viable alternative in many areas. In Washington state, farmers tapping into the depleted Odessa aquifer may be forced into dryland agriculture to survive.  Unless these farmers get permission to recharge such aquifers with waters from the Columbia River, in a decade's time the Odessa is projected to dry up.

Aquifer depletion is also affecting the southern Great Plains and West Texas.

With lower water levels in the Ogallala Aquifer, West Texas cotton farmers are already switching from irrigation to dryland cropping, which could cut their yields by at least half – from about 600 pounds to 300 pounds of cotton per acre.

Dryland farmers save money on irrigation, But other production costs remain about the same even as yields drop, said Jerry Hatfield, laboratory director at the USDA's National Lab for Agriculture and the Environment in Ames, Iowa.  That means an economic hit for growers turning from irrigated to dryland agriculture.

But many farmers don't have a choice. Some 12 million acres are already under such cultivation in the western U.S. alone, a number set to rise in the near future.

Part of that is water management: Atop the Ogallala aquifer in Texas and eastern Kansas, some groundwater levels have dropped so much that it's cost prohibitive to pump water to irrigate crops, said Brian Fuchs, a climatologist at the National Drought Mitigation Center at the University of Nebraska at Lincoln.

Farmers there are switching back to traditional crops, like sorghum and wheat more suited to a semi-arid environment.

But part of the transition is due to a changing climate, scientists say.

Arizona has been in a drought since the mid-1990s. Farmers around Phoenix, which averages only 8 inches of rainfall a year, continue to produce some of the country's highest-yielding cotton by flooding their fields with water from a huge local reservoir system. Nancy Selover, Arizona's state climatologist in Tempe, says that climate change is already eating into mountainous snow packs needed to replenish water reservoirs and aquifers during the state's long hot summers.

4 Comments

1. 1. eco-steve 07:07 PM 11/26/12

   Biomass pyrolysis produces hydrogen and biochar. The hydrogen can be burnt to produce electricity, and as a result, water. The biochar, (charcoal), can be pulverised and incorporated into soil thereby increasing its water retention capacity and avoiding the leaching of intrants. The biomass can be any organic matter, such as any non-alimentary crop residues. Biomass absorbs CO2 from air, and therefore inverses climate change. See www.eprida.com for details.

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2. 2. jtdwyer 02:11 AM 11/27/12

   http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ancient_Pueblo_Peoples
   "After approximately 1150, North America experienced significant climatic change in the form of a 300-year drought called the Great Drought. This also led to the collapse of the Tiwanaku civilization around Lake Titicaca in present-day Bolivia. The contemporary Mississippian culture also collapsed during this period. Confirming evidence is found in excavations of the western regions of the Mississippi Valley between 1150 and 1350, which show long-lasting patterns of warmer, wetter winters and cooler, drier summers."
   
   http://www.britannica.com/EBchecked/topic/243212/Great-Drought
   considers that drought to be of shorter duration:
   "The region affected by the Great Drought encompassed the area that extended from what is now Oregon to southern California and east to what is now eastern Texas; dendrochronology, or tree-ring studies, indicate that it began in ad 1276 and continued through 1299."
   
   "... The Great Drought was but one of several major periods of drought that have affected the same region in the past three millennia. Other periods of drought that have been identified are the Fairbank Drought of 500 BC and the Whitewater Drought of AD 300. Notably, all these dates appear to be related to major upheavals in the cultures of North and Central America."
   
   Apparently modern practitioners don't know much about the real potential magnitude of droughts that can occur - regardless of any effects of global warming...

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3. 3. Zachrey 10:59 AM 11/28/12

   How does he do it?!? Only six inches a year? We live near Taos, New Mexico, USA and get about twice as much rain and I'll be darned if I can get winter wheat to grow out here! The kangaroo rats dig up my seeds and any they miss, the rabbits finish off.
   
   We usually get some moisture in late July early August and then I plant the winter wheat. I am building terraces in this arroyo next to our house for winter wheat but what to do about all the rodents?!

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4. 4. Zachrey 11:02 AM 11/28/12

   BTW, what variety does he use and how deep does he plant it? I have a few more questions! :-)
   
   Does Mr. Nichols have an email I can get a hold of him at?

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