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There's A Lot At Stake In The Weekly US Drought Map (npr.org)
Crippling drought this year has caused more than $1 billion in damage. As it has played out, anyone affected by the drought or trying to manage it has turned to a once obscure map that has become key to understanding what's happening: the U.S. Drought Monitor. From a report: That includes water planners who decide resource allotments. Farmers who need water for their livelihood. Federal bureaucrats who use the map to calculate aid for the Livestock Forage Disaster Program. And then there are citizen scientists like Dave Kitts outside of Sante Fe, N.M. "I think it's a little obsessive, but I check it every Thursday," says Kitts, who has lived on the same 2-acre spread in New Mexico for decades. Dry years like this past one can crust the soil and kill his pinyon trees. "It's just upsetting and depressing to me," he says. "And when it moves the other direction, it definitely lifts my spirits."
Scientist Mark Svoboda started the drought map 20 years ago, when Congress took an interest after drought struck Washington, D.C. He directs the National Drought Mitigation Center at the University of Nebraska, Lincoln. "We're covering everything," he says, "from groundwater, stream flow, temperature." In bad drought years like this one, the map has patches of crayon yellow, orange and red that show the levels of drought. Right now, there's a deep crimson bull's-eye in the hardest-hit area of the southwest, where Colorado borders Utah, Arizona and New Mexico. The Drought Monitor map is updated weekly, often taking into account input from hundreds of people -- in addition to scientists. Ranchers and farmers from across the country also send missives to state and national offices, making the map a mix of art, science and farmer wisdom. But it starts with recommendations from state climatologists on any potential changes.
Scientist Mark Svoboda started the drought map 20 years ago, when Congress took an interest after drought struck Washington, D.C. He directs the National Drought Mitigation Center at the University of Nebraska, Lincoln. "We're covering everything," he says, "from groundwater, stream flow, temperature." In bad drought years like this one, the map has patches of crayon yellow, orange and red that show the levels of drought. Right now, there's a deep crimson bull's-eye in the hardest-hit area of the southwest, where Colorado borders Utah, Arizona and New Mexico. The Drought Monitor map is updated weekly, often taking into account input from hundreds of people -- in addition to scientists. Ranchers and farmers from across the country also send missives to state and national offices, making the map a mix of art, science and farmer wisdom. But it starts with recommendations from state climatologists on any potential changes.
Another good resource is https://waterdata.usgs.gov/nwi...
It even has data on dissolved oxygen and turbidity as well as the usual volume information.
No. Stop living in the desert. The "drought areas" are deserts and have been deserts for thousands of years. Diverting water from one place to another makes it worse.
this is dry reading.
Table-ized A.I.
Nice weather means clear skies. Without rain. Stop moving to dry areas and then complain that there is no water. Move to Minnesota. Land of 10,000 lakes.
Those interested should also look at http://www.cpc.ncep.noaa.gov/, the Web site for the Climate Prediction Center. This has predictions of rainfall and temperatures in the short-term, medium-term, next month, and next three months. It also has links to drought maps, both the subject "United States Drought Monitor" and maps predicting the evolution of droughts for the current month and the next three months.
Sure but it affects farmers so we all need to immediately freak out.
More perspective: Trump's Twitter-beef with China cost farmers $12B.
Yes, but you still have to live in Tennessee. Not really a fair trade. Plus, haven't you ever heard of the New Madrid quakes? Have fun if that happens again.
You live in a DESERT. You should not be living there.
Living in a desert is fine if you like the desert and are happy with cacti and rocks. The problem is people that move to the desert, install huge irrigation systems, and grow lawns that look like the green grass of England.
Everything you've said is false. I work at UNL and I know people who actually work shifts to update the US Drought Monitor (USDM). I'm not involved with that work, but I've learned quite a bit about what drought is and how the USDM is created.
Drought is based on conditions relative to climatological normals for that particular location. Climate is generally averaged over 30 year periods, so droughts are abnormally dry conditions relative to the average over the past 30 years. While the current D4 (exceptional drought) conditions are around the four corners area, which is generally arid, that's just where it happens to be abnormally dry now. You can look back over the drought monitor archive and you'll see drought conditions in many other areas.
Drought occurs when conditions are abnormally dry. Deserts exist where it's normally dry. In any location, water shouldn't be allocated in ways that are unsustainable. The High Plains are semi-arid, but they're not a desert. Agriculture in that region is driven by extracting water from the Ogallala Aquifer at rates far faster than the aquifer can be recharged. The best options are to bring water from other areas, which can be expensive, or to limit water use in a way that's more sustainable.
When water is brought in from other locations, it's referred to as an aqueduct rather than a pipeline, and such things do exist. For example, Los Angeles gets a substantial amount of water from the Los Angeles and Colorado River aqueducts. The Los Angeles aqueduct is 419 miles long, so water is being transported over quite a distance. The original poster is simply recommending a much more extensive aqueduct system to help alleviate droughts. It's reasonable, provided water isn't being transported from other areas is an unsustainable manner.
And no, not all deserts have been deserts for thousands of years. Sometimes that change happens over shorter time scales, though certainly beyond the 30 year definition of climate. For example, the Sandhills of western Nebraska are now semi-arid, with grass growing in sandy soil. Several hundred years ago during the Medieval Warm Period, western Nebraska was quite a bit drier, and the Sandhills were a desert with active sand dunes. Conditions are wetter now, just several hundred years later, and the dunes are stabilized by the grasses. Transition in and out of desert conditions doesn't necessarily require thousands of years.
The USDM map is updated during weekly shifts that run from Monday to Wednesday. Some are at NDMC in Lincoln, NE, by employees of the University of Nebraska-Lincoln. Sometimes the map is updated at other locations by USDA or NOAA employees.
There are five categories of drought ranging from D0 (near drought) to D4 (exceptional drought), and they're clearly defined based on observations. Despite this, the USDM map is more arbitrary than many might think. If you click that link, you'll see a variety of indicators for what constitutes each drought category. One challenge is what category to select when different indicators are in different categories. It's also a challenge about how to update the map when there's a rapid change in conditions. For example, if there's an area in D4, but the area receives several inches of rain in a few days, USDM authors are reluctant to reduce the drought category too much in a single week.
There's also the issue of what to do in areas in between observations, where it's somewhat subjective how to draw the contours for the drought monitor. Some local regulations and forms of aid for those impacted by droughts are directly tied to USDM categories. There can be a lot of money involved, and those who have money at stake will lobby the USDM authors to update the map in a way that's beneficial to them.
While reports are supposed to be made to state climatologists, who then pass the information along to the USDM author for that shift, that's not always how it works. Sometimes the USDM authors will receive lots of calls directly from various people in a particular county of region, lobbying for the map to be updated in a way that benefits them. I've heard of USDM authors getting lots of calls from farmers in particular counties, in a coordinated effort to get the drought category raised. I believe that some federal assistance becomes available at the D2 threshold, so often these calls are lobbying for the drought category to be raised to D2. If there isn't other data from that particular area, it's subjective and up to the USDM author for that shift how to proceed.
I've never updated the USDM and I don't work at NDMC, but I know people who do. I'm glad I'm not responsible for updating the map, because the shifts can be quite long if there are a lot of updates, and people can become pretty angry if the USDM author doesn't update the map the way those people want it updated.
Please guys, use private messages, or even encrypted services. These are valuable resources. They have science in them. They are related to climate change. The only way these resources will continue to stay useful is if Trump doesn't find out about them.
No. Stop living in the desert. The "drought areas" are deserts and have been deserts for thousands of years. Diverting water from one place to another makes it worse.
Umm, you don't really mean that....
On your first point, I'll offer something personal:
My family homesteaded several generations ago and started farming and ranching in a remote area near the Oklahoma & Kansas border. Family diaries describe the land as fertile and green, with native grasses growing knee-high or higher.
When I was a young child my grandfather and I took walks together in a pasture of native buffalo grass. He pointed out mostly dry mud holes around two to three feet deep that were the size of a back yard swimming pool that he said used to be buffalo wallows - places where the water table was at or near the surface, where native wildlife would congregate and paw away at the top layers of mud until enough water would pool to drink or lay down in. Sometime around 1900 his parents, my great grandparents, dug a 12 foot deep hole and lined it with bricks - this was the original well for the homestead. Years later my grandfather upgraded to a windmill, originally 60 feet deep. Then 90, and the windmill was replaced with an electric pump. Then, when I was a child, it was increased to 120 feet.
By the time my grandfather passed away, that once green pasture of native buffalo grass was rarely green, and no hint of the wallows or muddy spots had been seen for nearly 50 years. A relative had the well re-dug to 460 feet deep in order to find enough water flow to run both a simple water hose (to fill a stock tank for cattle to drink), and run water in a bathtub or shower at the same time. My grandmother used to time loads of laundry around when the cattle would drink out of the stock tanks, so that the washing machine would fill in a reasonable amount of time. We should have kept the windmill's cistern, but it was an expensive maintenance hog and a perpetual risk for contamination...
Not only has the Ogallala aquifer gone dry, but the rainfall seems to have changed a bit during the last century. So what was once a green and fertile area has since become a desert. Tough luck, eh?
As for your second point, history is full of examples of moving water around to build cities and support farm lands.
If we didn't move water around from one place to another, you city dwelling people would have a rather hard time watering your lawns, now wouldn't you?
Here's an alternate idea: stop watering grass for ornamental lawns. Everywhere. And, stop eating non-sustainable foods like irrigated corn and beef. I hear cricket protein bars are both tasty and nutritious.
"Every time I see an adult on a bicycle, I no longer despair for the future of the human race." - H. G. Wells