Drought subsides across Arkansas

Only 8.74% now rated exceptional

— Dry conditions continued to ease in most of Arkansas this week, reducing the areas of exceptional drought — the most extreme classification — to 8.74 percent of the state, down from 12.06 percent last week, according to a report released Thursday.

The news came as the U.S. Department of Agriculture announced that Arkansas would be the site of one of four regional meetings among state, local and federal agencies to “assess current and emerging drought recovery issues.”

As dryness spread this summer, the federal agency declared disaster areas in all or parts of 39 states, including Arkansas.

Arkansas conditions should continue to improve in the coming months as cooler weather patterns and shorter days reduce evaporation, forecasters said.

Several areas of the state moved into less intense classifications on the fourlevel drought scale this week — with the exception of portions of north Arkansas between Madison and Stone counties, which saw the least rainfall and remained at exceptional levels — according to the weekly report by the National Drought Mitigation Center at the University of Nebraska.

“Over a good part of the state we had a good rain last week, and that’s pretty well reflected in the drought monitor,” said John Robinson, warning coordinator with the National Weather Service in North Little Rock.

“But while some places got an inch or 2, some places got a quarter of an inch or less.”

Most of the state, 91.37 percent, remained in some form of drought this week, the report said. Nearly 42 percent of the state fell into the highest two levels, extreme and exceptional drought.

Exceptional drought is the most severe of the levels classified by the center. That level of dryness is associated with widespread crop losses and water shortages in reservoirs and streams.

A portion of southeast Arkansas — reaching into Jefferson, Arkansas, Dallas and Miller counties — was in moderate drought this week, the least severe of the four classifications, the report said.

In northeast Arkansas, an area bordered by Prairie, White, Independence and Sharp counties was in severe drought, the second-least-severe classification, it said.

Madison County, on the western side of the state’s remaining pocket of exceptional drought, saw the least rainfall over the past week, according to the Advanced Hydrologic Prediction Service.

The conditions have taken a toll on agriculture, Hindsville cattle farmer Jerry Hamm said.

“We have planted seed everywhere we can just to hope we can get through,” she said. “Our hay crop was about a third of what it’s been in previous years.”

Hamm ran waterlines from a spring to tanks in her pastures to replace long-dried-up ponds and allow her horses and cattle to drink.

As the county’s 4H coordinator, she helped children keep their poultry cool with impromptu misters created with box fans and hoses capped with rubber nipples.

They put lights over the birds at night to keep them awake and encourage them to eat after they stopped feeding in the heat of the day, Hamm said.

“It was really tough this year,” she said.

Robinson, with the National Weather Service, said conditions should gradually improve as cold fronts pass through the state, bringing precipitation with them in coming months.

Long-term projections by the National Weather Service show that Arkansas’ drought will ease, if not fully dissipate, by December.

The El Nino weather phenomenon is expected to redirect some weather systems, pushing moisture over the Gulf Coast and up into Arkansas, Robinson said.

“Things are looking more promising,” he said.

As new weather patterns emerge, agencies are working to adapt policies and shift resources to assist those affected by the drought.

“Recognizing that recovery from the drought that affected much of the Farm Belt will be a lengthy process,” U.S. Agriculture Secretary Tom Vilsack plans to hold regional meetings to organize resources to help with recovery, the Agriculture Department said in a release.

The meetings will kick off in Omaha, Neb., on Oct. 9, with meetings to be scheduled later in Ohio, Colorado and Arkansas, the release said.

Arkansas, Pages 9 on 09/21/2012

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