The hot, dry conditions across the Southeast are increasing demand for irrigation for many crops that are at peak water need. Evapotranspiration values are running as much as a quarter inch per day in the sunny southern areas. I’ve attached a map of yesterday’s ET for Georgia. You can really see how the sunny conditions in the south half of the state are ramping up the ET compared to the northern half, which had more rain and clouds. The mess on the map around Tifton is due to our UGA Weather Network station there being damaged by farm equipment, which snapped the steel tripod, cracked the wind gauge (used in the ET calculation) and broke off the lightning rod. Fortunately our technicians went down there today and fixed it up. You can read more at Southeast AgNet at https://southeastagnet.com/2020/07/21/irrigation-row-crops-hot-dry-conditions/.
