Nationwide
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April brought heavy rain to parts of the Midwest, South, and Southeast leading to broad areas of drought improvement in these regions. Meanwhile, drought expanded and intensified in the West, with many locations setting records for the driest 3-month period (January to March). This week, the High Plains remained unchanged with small pockets of improvements and degradations.
The West
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Parts of the Northwest saw a healthy dose of precipitation and mountain snow during the past week. In most cases, this precipitation fell over areas free from drought or wasn’t enough to bring relief to drought impacted areas.
Only southwest Oregon saw improvement with a slight decline in moderate drought (D1). Oregon also saw an expansion of severe (D2) and extreme (D3) drought. Water-year-to-date (October 1 to April 5) precipitation fell short and warmer-than-normal temperatures caused rapid and early melt out of the state’s snowpack.
Soil moisture and shallow groundwater indicators are reflecting the worsening conditions. In the southeast part of the state, the drought monitoring team noted impacts including extremely dry soil conditions, a lack of surface water, and poor pasture forage conditions. Central Washington, Idaho, and northwest Montana also saw increases in drought extent or severity as short-term dryness continues to build upon long-term moisture deficits extending back to last year.
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Many parts of southern Idaho, and the rest of the West, have set records for the driest 3-month period (January to March) going back 100 years or more. Meanwhile, near-record warmth increased evaporative demand from plants and soils.
Farther south, extreme drought (D3) expanded in parts of California, Nevada, and New Mexico, while moderate (D1) and severe (D2) drought expanded across Arizona. In California, Cooperative Extension reports impacts to agriculture, including reduced forage, livestock stress, decreased water allocation, and the selling livestock earlier than usual. Data such as reduced stream flows and declines in satellite-based vegetation health and soil moisture indicators confirm these reports.
The High Plains
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South-central Colorado saw a reduction in severe (D2) and extreme (D3) drought. Last week’s precipitation continued a trend of wetter-than-normal conditions in place since the start of the year. Short- and long-term indicators, including precipitation, snowpack, soil moisture, and stream flow, are responding to the excess moisture. Severe drought also decreased in southwest Wyoming for similar reasons.
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Kansas saw drought worsen in the west and improve in the east. D3 expanded in southwest Kansas, where precipitation deficits are less than 10 percent of normal over the last 60 to 90 days. Other indicators supporting this assessment include increased evaporative demand and soil moisture. The map depicts a continuation of improvements made last week in eastern Kansas. In south-central Nebraska, moderate drought expanded due to increasing precipitation deficits, dry soil moisture indicators, and reports of low stock ponds.
The rest of the region remained unchanged this week. State drought monitoring teams have all noted the increasing dryness across the region.
The South
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Like last week, the South saw drought worsen across west and south Texas and the Oklahoma Panhandle. Above-normal temperatures combined with below-normal precipitation and high winds exacerbated conditions. Drought indicators supporting the degradations include increasing precipitation deficits, dry surface and root zone soil moisture and low stream flow.
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One-category improvements were made to drought conditions across east Texas, southern Arkansas, north and central Louisiana and Mississippi as the effects of the recent wet pattern propagated through indicators such as streamflow, soil moisture, and vegetation. Note that the heavy, solid black line separating the part of the region experiencing short-term drought was modified to reflect the effects of the recent rain. —UNL Drought Monitor
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