Ticker for April 13, 2017

                
MESONET TICKER ... MESONET TICKER ... MESONET TICKER ... MESONET TICKER ...
April 13, 2017     April 13, 2017     April 13, 2017     April 13, 2017


Drought 101




I'm about to lay volumes of truth on you. PREPARE FOR A GOOD LEARNIN'! Ready?
Here goes...

Rain helps to end drought.

Here's another gem. And remember, you get what you pay for...

Lack of rain helps to intensify drought.

Don't take my word for it (although I'm offended). We have the perfect experiment
going on in Oklahoma to exemplify this. Check out the 30- and 60-day rainfall
maps from the Mesonet. Remember, sometimes it's not how much you received, but
how much you received relative to what you would climatologically expect to
receive.







Those maps make it pretty clear how we came to see these types of changes on the
Drought Monitor map, and the current map itself.






The green colors...good. The gray or yellow...bad. So we have seen widescale
changes across the NW 2/3rds or so of the state, and also far SE OK,  but in
between we have no changes or even intensification. And that matches up pretty
well with the rainfall pct of normal maps. Add ground truth reports from local
ag producers and county level NRCS/FSA offices and you get the current portrayal.
For the record, I did ask for a bit more improvements, but those were not
accepted. Maybe the upcoming increased chances for rain will get those changes
implemented. Those chances start today, rise again on Saturday through early
next week.





Rainfall amounts look pretty good across western OK for this storm, and the
7-day reflects some decent amounts for the series of storms added in early
next week.




What about after that, you say? More spring.

Sometimes wet, sometimes cold, sometimes dry, but always bold.

Gary "Will Shakespeare" McManus
State Climatologist
Oklahoma Mesonet
Oklahoma Climatological Survey
(405) 325-2253
gmcmanus@mesonet.org