After a Drought Last Year, Ohio Farmers Wished for Rain. Now Downpours Are Destroying Their Crops

The water in the creek was rising quickly, and Paul Tomcho could not reach his herd.

His southeast Ohio property—the aptly named Creekside Farm—was getting more rain than anyone in living memory could recall. Tomcho, who logs daily rainfall for the Community Collaborative Rain, Hail & Snow Network (CoCoRaHS), measured the total downpour at 4.28 inches in one hour. A calculator offered by the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration told him it was a one-in-a-thousand-year flood.

“My hope is that that’s correct,” Tomcho said with a laugh. “You know, we’ve been getting hundred-year floods like every three years.”

Tomcho raises goats and sheep. During the downpour, his animals were grazing on the other side of the creek, which had surged over its banks and into the field. If the ani