Ticker for March 9, 2004

                
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March 9, 2004      March 9, 2004      March 9, 2004      March 9, 2004



Wheat Belt Influence on OK Dew Points?

A snapshot of this morning's Mesonet dew point field may show the
influence of Oklahoma's rapidly greening winter wheat belt:



Notice the slightly elevated dewpoints along the axis of the wind.
The source region is coincident with the winter wheat producing
regions of Oklahoma and extreme SW Kansas.

A very dry late summer and fall took its toll on crops up there,
and we haven't yet seen a strong "green-up" in the satellite imagery:



However, when conditions are right, especially when winds are
aligned along the belt's axis, we can see a signal from the
growing crop.

OCS scientists have documented this wheatbelt phenomenon (and several
related phenomena) using fine-scale data from the Oklahoma Mesonet.
For a thorough examination, check out the McPherson et al. article
from the Feb 2004 issue of Monthly Weather Review.