Dire Forecast For Md., Va. Corn Crops

Drought Expected to Destroy Up to 80% in Some Areas

Farmers across Maryland and Virginia are predicting that the elongated drought that has swept across the mid-Atlantic region -- browning lawns, ruining gardens and prompting water restrictions in several jurisdictions -- will devastate their corn and other crops this year.

Although isolated thunderstorms battered certain areas Thursday, a lack of rain and forecasts of crop losses have prompted seven Virginia counties to apply for federal disaster designation. The designation would allow farmers to apply for low-interest loans, said Marion Horsley, a spokeswoman for the Virginia Agriculture Department.

Maryland will decide whether to apply for the designation by the end of next week, after all 23 counties covered by 21 local Farm Service Agencies have reported the amount of crops they expect to lose, said Roger Richardson, the state's secretary of agriculture. Any county experiencing a 30 percent loss in corn is eligible, he said.

By yesterday, 17 Maryland counties had reported estimated corn-crop losses ranging from 40 percent to 70 percent, said Mark S. Powell, chief of marketing and agricultural development for the state Agriculture Department. Virginia's drought has been concentrated in the southwest part of the state, creating statewide losses ranging from 30 percent to 80 percent, said Nelson Link, farm programs chief for the state's Farm Service Agency.

"A large percent of the corn crop is history," Richardson said, adding that the last time he could recall such a severe crop loss was in 2002. "Each farm you talk with, maybe one out of 10 said it was fair, and the rest said it was terrible."

State officials and farmers said it was too early to guess the financial loss from the drought. Many of such losses are covered by crop insurance. In 2006, about 67 percent of Maryland's 490,000 acres of corn and about 62 percent of Virginia's 480,000 acres of corn were insured, according to the U.S. Agriculture Department.

The U.S. Drought Monitor, a group of government and weather agencies that monitors rainfall's effect on crops and water supply, recently classified most of Maryland and Virginia as being in a moderate drought, indicating some crop damage, water shortages and a high risk of fire. Three Southern Maryland counties -- Charles, St. Mary's and Calvert -- and southwest Virginia were classified as being in a severe drought, indicating very high risk of fire and "common" water shortages. Parts of states in the south and west, including Tennessee, Georgia, Alabama, California and Arizona, have even more severe drought classifications.

"I think we've had an inch of rain for the last 70 days," said Joe Wood, who grows apples, peaches, grapes and wheat and runs a corn maze on a 100-acre farm in St. Mary's. Wood said that his apples are a little bigger than marbles and that the leaves on his three-foot-tall corn stalks have curled up, meaning the plants are struggling to survive. The maze is almost out of the question. If it doesn't rain in the next week, all 19 acres of his corn will be lost, he said.

"Everything needs water to grow, and nothing is falling from the sky," he said.

Rainfall at Reagan National Airport is about 50 percent of the 30-year average from June to this week, said Alex Sosnowski, a meteorologist at the private forecasting service AccuWeather Inc. Both ground and atmospheric temperatures are relatively warm, making it hard for thunderstorms to develop, Sosnowski said. And although it might rain this weekend, the drought will only get worse next week and in August, he said.

Still, it is not a record-setter, said Eric Luebehusen, a meteorologist with the U.S. Agriculture Department. This Spring was the 28th-driest in Maryland in 113 years, and it was the 15th-driest in Virginia, he said. "It's drier than normal, that is for sure, but in terms of record-setting dryness, we're a far cry from that," he said.

But it doesn't take a record-setting drought to kill crops, especially corn, said Earl F. "Buddy" Hance, Maryland's deputy secretary of agriculture, who owns a 400-acre farm of soybeans and corn in Calvert. Unlike soybeans, which are planted later in the year and could bounce back with an inch of rain every week for the next month, corn plants across Maryland are at the stage where they need water immediately to survive, Hance said. He expects to lose 90 percent of his corn crop.

The losses in Maryland and Virginia, however, are so small compared with the national production of corn that they won't have any impact on the crop's much-hyped $4 a bushel price, Hance said.

"We just don't grow enough corn in the mid-Atlantic and the South to have enough influence on the corn market," he said.

The drought was felt acutely in St. Mary's, where Leonardtown applied for an emergency permit to open its new well, said Laschelle Miller, the town's administrator. To get that permit, it had to ban outdoor water use.

In Loudoun County, Purcellville officials imposed mandatory restrictions on water use a week ago. Town residents are barred from watering lawns, washing cars and using power washers on decks or patios. Officials in Middleburg and Round Hill so far have opted for voluntary restrictions, urging residents to limit washing cars and watering lawns.

Frank Marx, who has cultivated a "pretty good green thumb" while tending the garden in his Silver Spring home for more than 50 years, said it is faring fairly well -- unlike his brown lawn.

"The grass -- it's beyond repair," he said. "I no longer care. I'm 90 years old. I've had enough."

Staff writers Arianne Aryanpur and Mariana Minaya contributed to this report.