Tue, 15 Jul 2025

Tue, 15 Jul 2025 Farmers face crisis as drought causes grass to fail

One farmer says she has never seen a spring and summer with so little rain.

* Dairy farmers in Wiltshire are facing a crisis due to this year's record dry spring, which has forced them to take unprecedented action.
* The long, hot summer has dried up natural pastures, leaving cows with no nutritional value from grazing.
* As a result, farmers like Sarah Godwin are having to feed their cattle grain that should be saved for the winter, spending thousands of pounds in the process.
* Professor Nicola Cannon blames the record dry spring, which is warming faster than any other season, and has led to a 50% drop in yields across Wiltshire.
* The Met Office's data shows that spring 2025 was the warmest and sunniest on record, and the driest since 1893, causing irreparable damage to grass growth.
* Climate change is identified as the main cause of these changes, with global temperatures rising by around 1.28C above those of the late 19th Century over the past few decades.
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