Weather Shakes Up This Week’s Drought Map

This week’s U.S. Drought Monitor showed more changes in areas of dryness and drought across the U.S. Heavy to locally excessive rainfall engendered broad areas of improvement in much of the Southeast, the lower Great Lakes region, the central and northern Great Plains, and many locations across the High Plains and adjacent southern Rockies, according to the most recent drought map.

Midwest

The Midwest experienced substantial, yet spotty, rainfall. Abnormal dryness (D0) was introduced on the map in part of south-central Kentucky, where conditions are like those observed across Arkansas and Tennessee, due to 30- and 60-day rainfall deficits. 

Central portions of the Midwest received significant rainfall over the past couple weeks, leading to some improvement in the dryness and drought that extended from extreme west-central Ohio westward over parts of northern Indiana and northeastern Illinois. East-central Indiana experienced its dryness eradicated. However, moderate drought persisted in east-central Illinois, with a small area of D0 expansion just to the east.

Nick Groth, Wisconsin Agronomic Service Representative for Syngenta Crop Protection, shared that the first half of last week was hot and humid followed by a welcome rain shower across much of Wisconsin, delivering a nice inch of moisture.

“The end of the week saw more mild temperatures with plenty of sun and smoke,” said Groth.

Ryan Gentle, Wyffels Agronomy Manager based in Marietta, Illinois, experienced brutally hot weather through Wednesday of last week but shared that Thursday through Sunday provided a welcome cooldown.

“Most of the area received anywhere from 1.5 to 2.75 inches last week with the Carthage area receiving the most,” said Gentle. 

Jared Goplen, Wyffels Agronomy Manager in northwest Iowa, southern Minnesota, and eastern South Dakota experienced a volatile week of weather that included a tornadic storm the evening of July 28-29 that brought with it some straight line winds and precipitation.

“In general, the amount of crop damage has been much less than anticipated considering winds in the 90 mph-plus range,” said Goplen. “Thankfully the corn is all well beyond pollination and has strong, lignified stalks along with good root development that minimized how widespread root lodging and greensnap were from the storms.”

High Plains

The U.S. Drought Monitor indicated that rainfall has varied in intensity across the High Plains with abundant rainfall totals over a large part of the Plains while lesser, subnormal totals were observed in the higher elevations farther west. 

A solid swath of moderate drought (D1) or worse covers most of southern and western Wyoming and the western half of Colorado, with severe drought (D2) covering a large part of this region, and extreme drought (D3) noted in a sizeable portion of west-central and northwestern Colorado. 

A broken pattern of heavy rainfall prevailed from northern Kansas through much of the Dakotas. The improvements left severe drought confined to part of south-central Nebraska and adjacent Kansas, southwestern Nebraska, and a small area in south-central South Dakota.

The USDA reported short or very short subsoil moisture across about one-third of Colorado and two-thirds of Wyoming in the latest Crop Progress report. In addition, 17% of the Colorado corn crop was in poor or very poor condition, and drier weather earlier in the summer has left one-third of the Nebraska oat crop in poor or very poor condition.

South

Reviewing the drought map shows that outside southern and western Texas, not much dryness or drought has been observed across the South Region. Since early May, rainfall totals exceed 3 inches in portions of south-central Texas, and approach 6 inches in part of the Big Bend. Despite recent improvement in much of the state, however, a small patch of exceptional drought (D4) persisted in upper South Texas, and severe drought continued in adjacent areas as well as parts of the Rio Grande Valley and Big Bend.

Despite recent drought improvement, 22% of the Texas cotton crop and 48% of its oat crop was in poor to very poor conditions, according to USDA.

How’s the Season Progressed?

See the image below to compare the drought status to early May.