Like most in the area, our CSA had a goodly portion of their fields flooded or severely damaged from Irene. The flooded parts are of no use for the rest of this season. It will take a lot of remediation to clean them of the diesel oil and sewage that was part of the floodwater, especially for an organic farm. The nearly finished crops in other fields - the tomatoes, the eggplants and the squash were fatally damaged by wind and rain. The farm will be finishing the season by breaking into their late season crops - greens and cole crops - sooner than planned. Those crops were knocked around but not destroyed.
But they are the lucky ones, compared to the dairy farmers who have just several weeks to rebuild barns for the winter. Most were able to move their cows and other livestock to higher ground, but they couldn't move the barns or the milking parlors. And they lost much of the current hay and silage that was being stored for the winter. They have a short time to make very big decisions.
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