BRYAN, Texas (KBTX) - Every county in the Brazos Valley is now considered to be in a D1 - Moderate Drought, according to the to latest monitor released Thursday, April 1st. Moderate Drought is the first stage of drought conditions.
How did we get back here? The grass and spring weeds have started to grow. Trees are greening up -- albeit late due to the February freeze. Wildflowers have popped up. Stock ponds and lakes are full or mostly full. So why is the Brazos Valley in a drought?
While the wildflowers and bluebonnets are adding color to fields and roadways, this year’s crop is less than years past. In Leon County, it is estimated to be as low as 25% of normal. The reason is not the February freeze -- seeds underground were insulated enough to escape harm -- but rather a lack of rain through the fall and winter.
January brought parts of the Brazos Valley 6″ or more of wet, heavy snow. Melted that only amounted to somewhere between 0.50″ and 0.75″ of liquid water. The snow that fell in February was drier, meaning it had less water content trapped in those flakes. February as a whole only officially brought Bryan-College Station 1.85″ of water to soak into the ground, a full inch shy of an “average” second month of the year.
The greatest reason drought has crept back in: La Nina (aka cooler waters in the Equatorial Pacific). This feature typically creates cooler-than-average and drier-than-average conditions for Texas and the Brazos Valley. That started showing up around the end of summer and the beginning of fall in 2020. Particularly the month of October which is typically the wettest month of the year for the Brazos Valley. For a month that generally produces around five inches of rain, Bryan-College Station collected less than half an inch. The drier weather snowballed from there (almost literally...).
Working backward, here are the stats that brought drought back to the Brazos Valley:
- March 2021: 1.73″ of rain fell -- falling short of the average by 1.53″
- February 2021: 1.85″ of rain or rain equivalent fell -- falling short of the average by 1.00″
- January 2021: 2.71″ of rain or rain equivalent fell -- falling short of the average by 0.75″
- 2021, as of April 4th, is behind by 3.20″ for the year
- October, November, and December of 2020 fell short of the average, expected rainfall in Bryan-College Station by 5.34″
- Since the end of last spring, the rainfall deficit totals 4.46″ (as of April 4th)
- Since January 2020, the rainfall deficit totals 12.66″ in Bryan-College Station (as of April 4th)
- 11 of the last 15 months have collected below-average rainfall in Bryan-College Station
The three-month outlook for rainfall in Texas and the Brazos Valley calls for a 40% to 50% chance of below-average rainfall, according to the Climate Prediction Center. Big rain events may take place during this time, however, on the whole, rainfall is expected to continue falling behind through the start of summer. Drought is expected to persist through -- at least -- the end of June.
As temperatures get warmer, agriculture and food production will continue to be increasingly aware of the significance of this lack of rain. Irrigation, where possible, will have to increase during a time that timely rain normally could be enough for growth. That, in turn, could increase costs from some farms in order to cover the cost of water.
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April 05, 2021 at 09:30AM
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The Brazos Valley is back in a drought: Here's how we got here - KBTX
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