Plenty of rain. We’ve certainly had that. What a difference 12 months makes. And we’ll talk with Corey Davis of the State Climate Office of North Carolina about that right now. But rain and fairly widespread, hasn’t it been, Corey?

“It really has been. Mike, I think we’ve reached the point of July where everyone is saying, Rain, rain, go away. We have had our share for the month, and then some, of course, you think back to last weekend. That’s when we had Tropical Storm Chantal come through. But pretty much every day since then, we’ve kept more rain showers, more thunderstorms moving across the state, and that has produced those pretty widespread heavy rainfall amounts, and we’re seeing that just looking at where we stand for the month of July. So far, it’s on track to be one of the top five wettest July is on record for places like Greensboro in the triad, down in Lumberton, also parts of the coast in North Carolina. And one stat that’s just shocking to me is out in Burlington, just on the west side of Raleigh, they’ve had almost 16 inches of rain so far this month, July of 2025 is already going to be the wettest month ever recorded in Burlington, and we’re barely even halfway through it. So again, just goes to show how wet things have been in parts of the Carolinas.”

Boy, you’re not kidding, that’s remarkable there. I was just alluding to, of course, what a difference from last year, when we were in a flash drought.

“That’s right, it was especially early June, late June into early July last year, when we saw several weeks of hot and dry weather, just barely a drop of rain that we could wring out of that pattern. And it was really at this point in July that we started to realize, oh, the toll that that had taken on the crops, especially the corn crop. The corn, usually during the month of June, is going through its silking phase. That’s when it’s very sensitive to moisture. It needs a lot of rainfall then so those silks can develop and get pollinated, and we just didn’t have that 12 months ago. But wow, have we been on the opposite side of that precipitation picture this year, but especially since late May into early June and early July, we have seen so much rain that has been a huge benefit for the corn, especially looking at the current crop progress report from the USDA, we are seeing 56% of the corn in North Carolina is in good condition. Another 26% in excellent condition. All in all, that’s more than 80% of the corn crop that is in really nice shape for this time of the year. We also see with the crop progress, 89% of North Carolina’s corn has made it through the silking phase, that very moisture sensitive time in its life, and now moving on to the dough phase as well. So that tells us the corn has had plenty of moisture. And again, that is a huge change from where we were last year. Just for reference, my mike looking at this same point in mid-July, 12 months ago, 29% of North Carolina’s corn was in poor condition. 44% was in very poor condition. Really just goes to show how bad off we were last year at this time, and by comparison, how wet and how sufficient than things have been so far this summer.”

Yeah, the biggest problem right now, I think, for farmers, may be just getting out in the fields, huh?

“Exactly. We got a good report this week from Hoke County down in the sand hills of North Carolina. This was one of those areas that did get some heavy rainfall from Chantal a couple weeks ago. The report said that most of the sending water after that storm has finally dried up, but there is so much moisture left in the soil in the fields that when the farmers are running their equipment through there. It is leaving ruts behind in the mud. So I know the farmers might be eager to get some of that moisture out of the way. But again, hard to about the rain we’ve had compared to where we were last year at this time.”

Yeah, I don’t think they’re going to complain too much. That is well within their memory from last year. But with that in mind, do we have any drying in the forecast?

“Well, Mike, can’t really say we have a huge dry stretch coming up, but we do at least have some warmer temperatures coming this weekend, and that might accelerate those evaporation rates to get some of that moisture out of the way. And now this is not going to be one of those extreme heat dome-like patterns like we had in late June. Instead, we’re looking mostly at high temperatures getting up into the mid-90s through the weekend. There’s weak high pressure system will be parked across the Carolinas, so that’s why we will be freeze warmer than normal. But this should not inhibit some of those daily showers and storms. There will still be enough moisture in the air that pretty much every day we should see some pop-up showers all across the Carolinas. And then as we head into early next week, those temperatures should back off a little bit closer to normal in the upper 80s to low 90s, but pretty much every day, keeping that chance of rain in the forecast. So, the places that have had rain looks like they’ll probably get a little bit more. And we should say, Mike, that not everywhere has enjoyed this rainfall coverage down in the Charlotte area and in parts of the upstate of South Carolina, they have actually missed out on the rainfall over the last few weeks. Places like Gastonia have only had about an inch and a half over the last 30 days, so they are looking for a little bit more rain just to top off their soil moisture reserves and make sure they’re not going to slide into drought as we had later into the summer.”

All right, so not only is it going to continue to rain, it’s going to get hotter. That’s what I heard. Great.

“Mike, this is the climatological hottest time of the year, the third week in July. Would you expect anything less than 95 degrees?”

No, no, I really wouldn’t. I want less than 95 but no, do I expect it? No, no, I do not.