Record heat Thursday, along with drought, creates bad recipe for crops

SOUTHERN OREGON, —It may be the hottest day of the year so far in the Rogue Valley.

Already dealing with drought in much of southern Oregon, it makes for a bad recipe for crops.

Ron Meyer has been in the pear business for around 70 years. He says he has never seen drought conditions this bad.

With the current conditions, Meyer says unless there is unusual rainfall between now and the summer, he says he probably won’t get a pear crop that can be irrigated enough to grow pears large enough to sell.

It’s not the first time he’s seen this problem, it’s actually one of the biggest reasons, Meyer is looking to get out of the orchard business.

“We have pulled up our pear trees so we are not going to be irrigating them we didn’t have to prune them and so we probably took them out at about the right time,” said Meyer.

Meyer sold about 33 acres of his orchard last year. With the remaining 80 acres, he plans to harvest hay for horses in the fall.