Hurricane Helene….Thoughts from the “Been there, done that” (Can we never do it again please?) Camp
I lived in North Florida many years ago and it was there I experienced my first hurricane. I remember being a bit freaked out until my boyfriend (now husband) explained how a category 2 was nothing to be worried about. And he was right. It blows my mind how the tropical storm strength of Helene was worse than that category 2.
Today, at almost a year past, I’d like to take a look back. It’s important to learn from events like this. It’s actually amazed me how many times I’ve thought to myself over this past year- “that’s a result of the hurricane.” You don’t realize how long lasting these effects are until you experience it first hand. I’ll of course be speaking from a farmer’s perspective. For reference, my farm was about 10-15 miles east of where the eye came through Upstate South Carolina. We were fortunate to have been on the Eastern side. And we by no means had anything close to the damage of North Carolina. Please know that I’m in no way trying to sensationalize what we encountered or diminish what Western NC went through last year. However I believe all experiences are valid and should be reflected upon.
So let’s get started: We prepared the same way we do for any big storm- tropical storms happen usually at least once during our Fall season. We made sure our plants were supported well- added extra string to tie things up, made sure netting was tight, etc. We cleaned up anything around the farm that could catch in the wind. We harvested everything possible before the storm hit (which was tough b/c we had torrential rains in the days before the hurricane). And then we hoped for the best.
At first I thought the flower farm had been mostly spared. It was flooded in a lot of areas but the drainage improvements we had made over the years were working (although slower than normal b/c of the water volume). We had trees down on our pig barn and our woods will never be the same- lots of sunlight now. And we’ll be cleaning it up for another year at least.
Then however I went to our offsite flower field:
This field got tossed. This field doesn’t have the trees as a wind barrier that our home farm does. We had multiple rows of white dahlias that were coming into bloom. We had harvested for one week off of this field. It was going to be one of our major sources of income for October. Losing the harvest from this field resulted in around a $6000 loss. Overall, the whole farm included, our season ended 3 weeks early last year due to the storm damage and lack of electricity to run a flower cooler.
Side Note: I’m going to state the financial loss - not b/c it’s all about that but because of climate change creating an increasingly unstable climate this is becoming a bigger issue for farmers. It’s important to be aware of it and knowing how it affects our agricultural industry. Yes, I know I grow flowers not food. But the income from these flowers provides jobs for multiple people.
The ground was totally water logged and I feared that I not only had a loss of cut stems but also tuber loss as well. Here’s the same rows in Spring of this year: (I estimate we lost 60% of the tubers in that field total)
The rows on the left and far right (off screen) were a total loss and the other two had a lot of holes- this picture was taken May 23. At that point I really felt like I had waited long enough to let the overwintered tubers resprout. These two rows were growing on second year roots when the storm hit which is why I think they survived. The first year roots just weren’t enough and rotted quickly. I tried leaving them in but in late March, we dug and found only a handful of decent tubers.
So at this point we began filling in the holes with tubers and some rooted cuttings. And these are the same rows (taken last week):
It’s back to how it looked right before the hurricane. The resiliency of plants amazes me!
Other losses incurred from the hurricane- around $2000 of loss product that was stored in our flower cooler. This could have been much higher if the storm had come earlier in the week. We had delivered most of our product for the week (for events that were mostly cancelled). We had a gorgeous compost pile.
Since then we have acquired a generator set up that can run our flower cooler. Storms that knock out the power for a day or two are not uncommon around here.
We also lost a lot of herbaceous perennials due to flooding which resulted in loss income this past spring. Our yarrow and phlox were the worst and a total loss because they sat in saturated soil, mostly underwater for 2 days. ($3000 income loss)
However the biggest loss came in the reduction of the amount of tubers we dug a month later. What we found was good but once it was all divided, we had around 50% of the volume we normally have. Tuber sales are a major income generator for our farm. They provide income that pays our employees through the winter. Income that pays for supplies, seeds, plants that you have to buy when you don’t have any flowers to sell. When we finally got to the end of Spring and tuber sales were finished for the year, we came out around $10,000 less than previous years. I was thankful we had already begun planning to sell rooted cuttings before the storm struck. It could have been worse. The cutting sales made up a decent portion of the tuber loss.
There’ve been other random plants that I’ve noticed throughout the year- some of our daffodils rotted from flooding (and those things are so tough- this was surprising to me!) So many times I’ve realized small things that are a result of the hurricane this past year. Overall, an income loss of $18000+.
I know this is small compared to some farms that were literally washed away. But like I said before, I think all experiences are valid and should be shared. I think the real question is- how did we continue on? How were we resilient?
Well on my farm that looked like a couple of things: we ramped up the rooted cutting offerings to more than we had originally planned for our first year. We held a spring and fall plant sale. We began a cut flower membership community. All these things helped fill in the income gaps.
But more importantly, I’ve learned what this little farm and crew are capable of. I think this has been one of the hardest years of farming I’ve ever been through (yeah, even worse than covid). But I’ve seen what pivoting your business, being willing to change and innovate- how those can open doors you didn’t see coming. I’ve worked with the best farm crew I’ve ever had this past year! Seriously wouldn’t still be farming without them. There have been so many times they’ve taken the reins in one area when I had needed to focus on another.
So looking back a year later? Do I wish it never happened? Well - yeah I think we all wish we didn’t have to learn lessons by going through adversity but I’m old enough to know that is how life works. So as we come up on this first anniversary of the storm I hope we never see the likes of again, I hope you reflect and I hope you find your life better than it was.
