Agriculture across multiple mountain counties has been significantly impacted by floods from Hurricane Helene.
The WNC Regional Livestock Center in Canton, North Carolina, has been packed with supplies instead of cattle in the weeks following Helene. Farmers from the area said they lost dozens of cattle and many lost land.
Annie Ager and Addie Lalumondier operate Hickory Nut Gap Farms, a nonprofit in Fairview, North Carolina.
“We get hay from guys locally, and then some of them have lost it because of bad weather,” Ager said.
The two said that while their barn escaped damage, not everything else was spared.
“The rest of the farm area was pretty damaged, and like Annie said, our access to hay has been pretty compromised,” Lalumondier said.
As word spread, hay was soon stacked all around to help farmers in need recover.
“I’m amazed at the amount of people donating,” Ager said. “It’s incredible.”
People are coming from far and wide to the livestock center to drop off feed for animals, and volunteers are also bringing needed materials.
“We’re just collecting stuff and bringing it up here,” Billy Farmer said. He and his wife, Janice, have made multiple trips from Georgia to help Western North Carolina farmers. “Right now they’re asking for a lot of fencing,” Farmer said.
Billy said he and his wife especially want to help the animals. “It’s the livestock and the animals — dogs, cats, chickens, horses, goats; they’re the ones that can’t help themselves,” he said.
Terry Kelley, Henderson County’s tree fruit agent with the Extension Office, said Henderson County is “pretty big in agriculture,” telling News 13 the crop loss from Helene is “massive.”
“The crop loss alone could easily exceed $50 million,” Kelley said.
As Henderson County is also known for apples and other perennial crops, including peaches and blackberries, Kelley said there is more than the initial loss from the storm.
“These trees and plants that were lost, when they’re replaced, we’re not going to be getting any yield from them for anywhere from two to five years,” he said. “It’s a very big loss and it has a lot of multipliers involved.”
Like many, Henderson County will look for assistance at all levels.
“The USDA has several programs that will be able to help some of our farmers, and some of them have insurance, so that’s a good help too,” Kelley said. “But it doesn’t cover all the costs and all the loss.”
Kelley said he believes recovery will take a long time.
Content from The National Desk is provided by Sinclair, the parent company of FOX45 News.
