MESONET TICKER ... MESONET TICKER ... MESONET TICKER ... MESONET TICKER ... January 15, 2014 January 15, 2014 January 15, 2014 January 15, 2014
The little farm pond that still can't
Veteran Ticker know three things about me:
1. I'm devilishly handsome 2. Cold weather doesn't suit me 3. I'm not really devilishly handsome 4. I have an unhealthy obsession with a small little spring-fed farm pond south of Buffalo. E. I'm not good at counting
As the drought trudges on now well into its fourth year across western Oklahoma, many areas that were impacted way back in early 2011 still have not seen anything close to a full recovery. That's where the little farm pond comes in. Yes, it is my favorite place in the universe, dry or not. I grew up fishing there and running the canyons it sits in south of Buffalo. It had never been dry prior to this current drought. The drought of 1995-96 took it way down, but it just made it easier to fish. The 2005-06 drought was no picnic either. But it, and the state, had not seen the type of drought we're currently experiencing in decades. The ferocity of the drought from October 2010-September 2011 was reminiscent of some of our big baddies from the 1930s and 1950s. But it was still just a year.
http://ticker.mesonet.org/archive/20140115/oct2010-sep2011-tots.png http://ticker.mesonet.org/archive/20140115/oct2010-sep2011-departure.png
That period is actually known as a "water year." The statewide average during that 2010-11 water year was 20.05 inches, 16 inches below normal and the second driest on record (1956 still #1). Deficits across the state ranged from 8 inches to more than 20 inches. Notice Buffalo up there in the far northwest corner received a meager 10.6 inches, about 15 inches below normal. The little pond actually suffered throughout much of 2010 after a glorious 2009, until finally drying up completely during the 2011 spring.
Here's a jaunt back over the last four years, starting with May 2009, about a month after a blizzard buried northwestern Oklahoma with as much as 26 inches of snow. Never had it looked this green when the picture was snapped.
http://ticker.mesonet.org/archive/20120126/may2009.jpg
Following that, you can track the drought's progress by the declining levels of the pond. You can see the impacts of the summer 2010 flash drought in the first picture below, BEFORE the drought really got going in late fall.
http://ticker.mesonet.org/archive/20120126/aug2010.jpg http://ticker.mesonet.org/archive/20120126/may2011.jpg http://ticker.mesonet.org/archive/20120126/jan10-2012.jpg http://ticker.mesonet.org/archive/20121009/mar8-2012.jpg http://ticker.mesonet.org/archive/20120806/aug5-2012.jpg http://ticker.mesonet.org/archive/20121009/pond-oct7-2012.jpg http://ticker.mesonet.org/archive/20130308/pond-march6-2013.jpg
I hadn't actually visited the pond in awhile. It's tough for me to see, after all. But on a trip to speak about, what else ... drought, in Garden City, I thought it was finally time to go back and check on the levels. Buffalo has had some "decent" moisture since March, after all. So maybe it had gone from mudhole to actual pond again? Here are the rainfall totals since that March 6 visit, and my reason for cautious optimism (I visited the pond on January 8, but I'll include the next week as well anyway since nothing fell).
http://ticker.mesonet.org/archive/20140115/march7-jan15-tots.png http://ticker.mesonet.org/archive/20140115/march7-jan15-deps.png
Well, 18 inches! That looks promising. It's still around 6 inches below normal, but surely enough to give a pond a boost, right? Let's take a look at the pond from January 8, 2014.
http://ticker.mesonet.org/archive/20140115/jan8-2014.jpg
A bit underwhelming, unfortunately. It has gone from a small mudhole in March to a bit of a bigger mudhole 10 months later. If it was summer, it would not be suitable for the cattle to drink from, and definitely not enough water to begin re-stocking any fish! It might have been at a higher level earlier in the year when the rains were coming a bit more steadily, but the problem is the moisture has largely gone away from western Oklahoma, especially in the northwest. Here is the 90-day rainfall map from the Mesonet with radar-estimated overlay. A scant 1.3 inches around Buffalo since early October (and it looks that way across much of the northwestern half of the state). The 120-day is no beauty either.
http://ticker.mesonet.org/archive/20140115/90day-rain-totals.png http://ticker.mesonet.org/archive/20140115/120day-rain-totals.png
It has now been 87 days since Buffalo has seen at least a quarter-inch of moisture in a single day. Caveat: there might have been a period where more than a quarter-inch stretched through midnight, but the point of the map remains the same.
http://ticker.mesonet.org/archive/20140115/mesonet.rainfall.quarterinch.png
Alva is even worse at 107 days, but things are tough all over across much of western Oklahoma extending northeast up into Payne County.
It's drought on the rise again. We are extremely lucky on two counts.
1. It's the cool season. 2. This cool season has been REALLY cool.
If this were August, we'd see a large part of western Oklahoma covered by Exceptional (D4) drought. Now it has started to get warm again, however. The winds have been ferocious. Fire danger is getting a head start by about a month. No relief in sight just yet either ... all making a bad situation worse.
http://ticker.mesonet.org/archive/20140115/7day-rain.gif
http://ticker.mesonet.org/archive/20140115/jan22-28-precip-odds.gif http://ticker.mesonet.org/archive/20140115/jan22-28-temp-odds.gif
The Canadian forecast model we sometimes look at for precipitation probabilities sees a ZERO chance of at least a half-inch of rain or so through the end of January for much of Oklahoma.
http://ticker.mesonet.org/archive/20140115/can-model-rain-chances.gif
Things can change around in a hurry and we can return to our more active pattern of the last couple of months. At least it was active for the southeastern half of the state. The problem is getting the northwestern half more active.
Until then, the fishing hole is closed.
Gary McManus State Climatologist Oklahoma Climatological Survey (405) 325-2253 gmcmanus@mesonet.org
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