Fall Rains Have Come!

My grandparents mostly farmed bottomland of two small rivers ( Little Harpeth and Big Harpeth, named for brothers who killed people and threw the bodies in the river). The land was fertile, as river bottom usually is, but farming there is always risky. The spring floods came every year except during extreme drought. Both rivers would flood over their banks for a week or two, depositing rich silt and organic material, but leaving the ground saturated so that crops went in late, after things dried out enough to plough the fields. 

Tennessee has a long growing season, so that might not be a problem, except for two more seasonal happenings. We usually have a dry July/August with very little rain. Then things shrivel up. With the spring soaking, the bottomlands held more water and could be irrigated from the rivers until they, too, dried up to barely flowing creeks you could cross on foot without getting your rolled-up pants wet. Then some years the fall rains came, bringing welcome moisture, but the risk of flooding. That's what we have this year. It is all within normal variation of rainfall for Tennessee. But late planting and a fall flood could be devastating to harvests. No wonder my grandparents switched to mostly growing hay and grazing beef cattle in the bottoms, except for a few vegetable patches.