VIDALIA — Despite being under major flood warnings for weeks, it’s a lack of water that is causing problems for many area residents.

Area farmers are facing an almost two-month-long drought, leaving many crops, especially corn, clinging to the hope of just one good rain.

“This is affecting everybody,” Concordia Parish farmer Al Ater said. “Conditions are going downhill, not daily, but hourly.”

Ater said the Miss-Lou has been without substantial rain since mid-April, and two months without rain has put area crops in a risky situation.

“We need some rain bad,” he said. “It’s at the serious to critical condition now.”

Ater said that while cotton and soybean crops still have some time to get rain before they are harvested, area corn crops need rain as soon as possible.

“We are 45 days away from the corn harvest, and I have looked at some corn that all the water in the world wouldn’t change,” he said.

With corn crops doing so poorly, Ater said a good rain would only be enough to make do.

“It’s like a person losing one leg and then the other to stop an infection,” he said. “You aren’t going to get your legs back, but you are still alive and have everything else on your body.”

Ater said area farmers just need a good inch to two inches of rain as soon as possible to help start turning things around.

“A rain today probably isn’t going to change an awful lot,” he said. “But it will help, and that is all we can ask for at this point.”

Ater said his farm has been doing fine due to irrigation, but additional costs of watering the plants is affecting the farm.

“We were able to water and things are looking pretty good, but it is an awfully expensive operation, especially with the cost of diesel right now,” he said. “We are still able to water, and we are thankful for that, but the costs are something that could eat into our profits.”

Ater said his farm, located near Frogmore Plantation, was also lucky enough to receive a little over an inch of rain June 3.

“We were very fortunate for that, but it was a very localized rain,” he said. “Places around Lake St. John still haven’t gotten any moisture since April.”

Ater said he is going to continue operations at his farm like normal, and hold out hope that a good rain is around the corner.