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One of the benefits of all of our rain this year has been a reduction in the potential for wildfires. The four-month outlook for significant wildfires from the National Interagency Fire Center shows below-normal potential for each of the next four months. You can see the maps and read more using the link to the…
Posted in: Climate outlooks -
The latest round of ENSO forecasts now puts the chances of an El Niño occurring this winter at 70%, up from 64% last month. Generally once you get past spring, forecasts become more reliable and trustworthy, although they are certainly not perfect. The El Niño, if it occurs as expected, is likely to bring cooler, cloudier…
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The latest Drought Monitor, released today, shows that the small regions of abnormally dry conditions in Alabama have generally shrunk in the last week due to recent rains. However, the area of abnormally dry conditions that span the NC-SC border in the Piedmont has generally expanded, since those areas missed rain that hit elsewhere in…
Posted in: Drought -
NOAA’s Climate Prediction Center produces long-range forecasts for several time periods, including 6-10 days, 8-14 days, 3-4 weeks, and for one to three months at a time going out to as much as a year ahead. Most of these forecasts provide shading to indicate where the probabilities are tipped towards warmer or colder than normal…
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Irma hit the Florida peninsula almost ten months ago, causing heavy damage to many farms in the region. Producers are slowly recovering from the impacts of the winds and flood, but dairy farmers have been slow to benefit because of a clause in the recovery legislation which barred dairy farmers from recouping losses since milk…
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NASA’s new GRACE satellite can provide a snapshot look at soil moisture conditions across the entire US. The maps come out one a week at https://nasagrace.unl.edu/. This week’s map shows a streak of wet conditions stretching from Alabama north to Ohio, but dry conditions in southeast Georgia and north into most of South Carolina and central…
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In recent weeks I have not heard much about drought in the Southeast (and no wonder, considering how wet we have been), but in past droughts I got a lot of questions about our drought status as depicted in the Drought Monitor. Here’s an interesting story about how the Drought Monitor is produced, basically on…