Could hail cause a widespread crop failure?
Some of the missing wildlife foods are:
Wild Persimmon (shown in the picture)
Acorns (several species)
Hickory Nuts
Walnuts
Osage Orange balls
Wild Plum
Sweet Gum
Eastern Red Cedar
Lorna and I have been trying to understand the unusual lack of Fall food over the 600-acres here at the Prairie Garden Trust. It was a perfect growing year with plenty of moisture and no late frosts. However, we did have one bad hail storm right when the leaves were popping out in the early Spring. We think that the trees put energy into replacing the damaged leaves instead of making fruit.
It will be interesting to see how this lack of fruit will impact the animals. Many birds and mammals depend on acorns. Because hail storms typically only occur in small areas perhaps the animals can find food on neighboring properties.