It’s sprinkling outside my window here in Aberdeen, but South Dakota, Minnesota, and North Dakota remain under the northern arm of the drought that is parching the western United States:
As of Tuesday, 90.1% of South Dakota was in moderate, severe, or extreme drought. That figure is up just a touch from last week’s 89.7%; at the end of April, 64.3% of South Dakota was in some stage of drought. 17.9% of the state—a large patch on the northern stretch of the river and over to the 99th Meridian, a mean red arm arcing over the Highway 34 corridor, and a growing patch of parch from Pierre to Philip and Kadoka—is in extreme drought. That’s up a wee bit from last week’s 17.6% but down from the 19.4% at the end of April. A year ago, only 14.0% of South Dakota was in any drought category and none of the state was worse than D2—severe.
South Dakota has yet to creep into the UNL Drought Monitor’s worst category, D4, exceptional drought; 10.4% of North Dakota is sweating under D4 conditions, in a blob running from the Garrison Damnorth and east to Rugby and Fessenden.
We had a beautiful, extended, cooling rain storm for what seemed like hours last night. I woke up this morning to happy grass and trees and flowers.
Thank goodness!
Our local farmers and ranchers will – hopefully – be putting up some more of that super nutrient dense hay.
We’re going to need it.
Well…it could be worse…we had enough sub soil moisture that with a little rain most people will get a crop of some kind…the key is to recharge that sub soil moisture with fall rains and winter snow….if that doesn’t happen the pastures will be full of hungry cows next summer.