A drought that has been lingering over New England and some other parts of the Northeast is worsening.
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| A drought is worsening in the Northeast. The darker the color on the map, the worse the drought. |
This includes Vermont, of course.
According to the latest weekly U.S. Drought Monitor, released Thursday, almost all of New England, much of New York and a good chunk of Pennsylvania are in drought.
As of Thursday, all of Vermont except a small corner of Rutland County is at least abnormally dry. The eastern two -thirds is in moderate drought. The Connecticut River Valley from about White River Junction north was upgraded to severe drought with this week's Drought Monitor update.
If you think things are bad in Vermont, it's even worse in the eastern half of New England. All of Rhode Island, and adjacent parts of Connecticut and Massachusetts, southeastern New Hampshire and southwestern and northeastern Maine are in extreme drought.
The U.S. Drought Monitor has a five point scale representing drought conditions. Going from not so bad to terrible, the ratings are, abnormally dry, moderate drought, severe drought, extreme drought and exceptional drought.
Thankfully, no parts of New England are in exceptional drought, at least not yet.
The current New England drought is definitely having some real-world consequences. Some of the hardest hit areas are having wells run dry with new ones having to be dug. Pretty much region wide, pasture lands and crops are suffering. Forest fires are starting to break out throughout New England.
Vermont is faring badly, but not as badly as further east because Tropical Storm Isaias dumped some heavy rains west of the Green Mountains in early August. Also, dying cold fronts made it into Vermont occasionally over the summer. These fronts dumped scattered downpours in the Green Mountain State before evaporating on the way past the Connecticut River.
Things have definitely worsened in September, as we have had virtually no rain. Unless some predicted good rains materialize on the final couple of days of the month, which is possible, many New England towns and cities, including most of Vermont, will have their driest September on record.
As has been the case all summer, any rain that comes in during the beginning of the week is most likely in Vermont, and less likely in eastern New England.
It's also unclear how much rain will come. Many computer models spit out a decent amount of rain locally, with the possibility of 1.5 inches of precipitation between Monday and Wednesday. Of course, that's no guarantee.
Those computer models have been trending the precipitation further and further west as we get closer to the event, which risks making us miss out
Even if we get a good soaking next week, that would not come close to solving the problem. The ground is super dry, groundwater is lacking. It would take a tremendously wet autumn to get back to normal.
Here's something to illustrate. I have 15-inch deep raised beds on my property. I dug through one fallow raised bed that I hadn't watered all year. It was basically dust for the whole 15" of soil, and the clay earth below that was also bone dry at depth of at least three inches. (I didn't dig any deeper than that).
Also, in an area in back of my house, it's usually swampy. Every time I go up there, I sink into the mud. Now, that area is also dry as a bone. This isn't good.
The New England drought isn't as bad or as widespread as the one out in the western United States. But, it will be nasty deep in this winter if we don't get decent autumn rains. Imagine a well going dry during a 20 below cold snap in January?
I for one, will be doing rain dances for awhile.
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