Mike St-Pierre was in the barn at his farm, Double-G Farms in Clarendon, when the first of two storms hit on Aug. 10. 

Environment Canada had warned of a possible tornado event in the Pembroke and Cobden area, but downgraded the warning by the time the storm was crossing into Quebec. Nonetheless, the weather event still brought high winds, thunder and lightning, and golf-ball sized hail as it carved a path through North Clarendon. 

“My daughter called me and said the animals got struck,” he said, reliving the moment she shared the news that four of his heifers had been hit by lightning.  

“I went out to check on them, it was pouring rain, and I got soaking wet. I probably shouldn’t have because there was lightning still, but they were deceased when I got there.”

The farm, which he co-owns with several other family members, is home to some 240 cows, including calves. 

“It’s pretty well a $2,500 loss each one, but two of them were worth a bit more genetically than others,” said St-Pierre. “It bothers me, but also it doesn’t because none of my kids, nieces or nephews got hurt.” 

Double-G Farms, located between the 8th and 9th Concessions, is just a few miles east of Steve Acres’ farm on the 7th Concession, where he lost at least 250 acres of corn and soybean crops to the hail. 

His field of soybean plants on the corner of Radford Road and 7th Concession, just one field in his 1,600 acres of crops, was almost unrecognizable after the storm, the plants shredded to pieces with not much left but their leafless stems. 

“I’ve never seen that. Even the old guys have never seen it that bad around here,” Acres said. 

“There’s 240 to 250 acres that are completely written off, and 740 that were hit pretty hard and probably won’t make it but we don’t know yet.” 

He said the survival of some crops will depend on nature’s cooperation, and hoped for cloudy, dry weather to allow the plant tissue to rebuild itself. He said he’s been in touch with his crop insurance people, but is still waiting to hear back from them on what can be done. 

And this isn’t the first climate challenge to Acres’ farm in the past year. In the same fields where some of his corn was destroyed, he had planted soybeans last spring. But the summer’s drought meant he only got half a crop out of it. He then no-tilled winter wheat into the field in September, but the fall’s dry weather meant it didn’t germinate until October. The cold winter left the crop dead on most of the field’s hills. 

“So I burned it all off and put in corn. So now I’ve planted beans, corn, wheat, all on that one field within 12 months, and I still don’t have a crop. It’s a kick in the nuts. Just how unlucky can you be?” he asked, noting the uptick in extreme weather events he’s noticed in recent years. 

“It’s hard to process. Your whole year, all your work . . . I don’t know how you explain it.”

Acres’ neighbours a block south at the Little Red Wagon Winery also saw significant crop loss in the storm. The vineyard’s grapes were bruised by the massive golf-ball sized hail that dropped from the sky. 

Owner Jennifer Judd said by her estimates, she will lose between 15 and 25 per cent of this year’s harvest.

“We’re hoping the bruised grapes will dry up and scab over. If they do, we’ll be ok, but if they don’t they’ll continue to rot and because the clusters are so tight, it spreads,” she explained.  

She said regular challenges to the crop have included mould and mildew, black rot, and the ever-deadly late spring frost, but never hail. She looked into buying crop insurance when she was just starting the winery, but found it too expensive when she had yet to make a penny. Her insurance, she said, is the extra wine inventory she carries over from year to year, but acknowledged she may need to reconsider as extreme weather events become more regular.  

“I think [storms] are getting more frequent in our area, these little microbursts or whatever you want to call them,” she said. 

“I wonder, moving forward, what we’re going to be up against. When you don’t know what’s coming and you kind of consider it a freak of nature, it’s not a big deal, right? But if this is a sign of what’s happening moving forward, who knows?”