Here in farm country lack of precipitation does not go unnoticed, in fact most producers accumulate “lack” of rain in their mind the same way they accumulate rain in a rain guage and right now northwest and west central Iowa are getting dryer by the day. As I type this on December 28th its 49 degrees outside, the sun is shining bright and there is barely a cloud in the sky, nor any frost in the ground. The rest of the forcast in the 10 day shows temps well above freezing and the next 5 in the 50′s nearly kissing 60 degrees. Now its not unusual to once in a while experience a nice day or two this time of year in Iowa, but what is unusal is this dry warm pattern we have been locked in for several months now. Meteorologists attribute it to a weather pattern known as La Nina. Regardless of what its called we’re thankful for the little bits of rain and snow we’ve gotten, it looks like we are for sure in for a dry winter.
I’ve monitored the drought situation over the past few months which originally appeared to be an extension of the severe to exceptional drought in the south but snow and rain across northern Kansas, northern Missouri southern Nebraska and southern Iowa in December have separated the southern and northern droughts but certainly thats subject to change as precipitation is missed or added each week. I know some in western Iowa are perplexed, we had flooding in the Spring that lasted until August, they wonder how did we end up in a drought already? The truth is most of that water was not our, we did have a good average Spring but the snowmelt in the mountains where the head waters of the Missouri River as well as above average precipitation in the Dakotas, and possibly failure on the part of the US Army Corps of Engineers resulted in our 2011 abundance of water, it wasn’t because that precip fell here. Even today, many don’t recognize we are in the early stages of drought as they enjoy the beautiful winter weather rather than scooping snow or warming up cars every morning. Instead today you could spend the day in the yard raking leaves in a sweatshirt and pretend its mid fall!
I’ve always been told you can not make up for missed rain and it seems that agronomists can have differing points of view on that and each farm can store moisture at differing capacities depending on the tillage practices on the farm and organic content in soils, even soil types and slopes will affect stored moisture. An interesting article “Drought Concerns Next Years Planters” quotes Iowa State University agronomist Mahdi Al-Kaisi as saying “Iowa isn’t necessarily doomed to a poor crop next year because moisture is short right now. “Moisture deficiencies can be made up,” “I’m not terribly worried yet.”
Corn and Beans are not the only concern, one of the biggest casualties of the southern drought has been the cattle business, it takes water to grow grass as well and if you look at cattlemen and women as people that grow cows for a living you are starting at second base, those with pasture operations are grass farmers, their end product is the cows that graze their pastures. Even though you don’t see a person headed out to pour water on their cows to grow it does impact pasture operations very quickly and when you consider the costs of trucking in hay from other parts of the country you can quickly see that its a smarter financial decision to start selling cattle quickly versus paying long term for hay shipments.
Here is today’s current assessment of the drought, and here’s to rain, keep and eye to the sky.
Latest Seasonal Assessment - The drought outlook for December 15, 2011 – March 31, 2012 was based upon climate anomalies associated with La Niña, short to medium range forecasts, climatology, and initial conditions. Persistence or development can be expected across much of the Southeast with the highest forecast confidence in Florida. However, the prospects for improvement increase closer to the southern Appalachians. Since early November, frequent precipitation and seasonably cooler temperatures resulted in drought improvement across the southern Plains. Additional improvement can be expected in southeast Kansas, eastern Oklahoma, and northeast Texas, while monthly and seasonal precipitation forecasts favor persistence across the remainder of Texas and the southern high Plains. Despite the early winter snowfall in Arizona and New Mexico, La Niña elevates the odds for drought persistence across the Southwest. Drought development is forecast for parts of California associated with a dry La Niña signal, and development potential extends north into the southern Sierras due to a lack of early winter snowfall. A relatively dry winter climatology elevates the chances for persistence across the western Corn Belt and upper Mississippi Valley. Drought improvement is forecast for Hawaii which is consistent with a La Niña winter.