The drought continued to ease in central and western Arkansas this week, but forecasters are concerned that dry conditions are worsening in portions of south Arkansas.

Half of the state remainedout of drought, according to the National Drought Mitigation Center’s weekly report, issued Thursday. The center at the University of Nebraska-Lincoln gathers rainfall amounts, and climate and other meteorological data when compiling its weeklyreport. Two weeks ago, 32 percent of the state was not in any form of drought.

Much of this week’s improvement was evident along a band stretching westward from Pulaski County to Logan County where conditions moved from “moderate”drought - meaning the area is deficient by 2-3 inches of rainfall over a 30-day period - to “abnormally dry,” or deficient by 1-2 inches of rainfall over 30 days.

The Pine Bluff airport measured 2.18 inches of rain Aug. 13 - the day the droughtmitigation center cuts off its data-collection for its weekly reports. That rainfall is reflected in this week’s report, said National Weather Service warning coordinator John Robinson of North Little Rock.

Jefferson County went from being classified as in “severe” drought, with a 30-day deficiency of 3-4 inches, to “moderate.”

“It rained mostly in Jefferson County,” Robinson said. “It didn’t move further south, and it fizzled out.”

Monticello, some 50 miles south of Pine Bluff, reported receiving only 0.24 inches of rain Aug. 13 from the same system that moved through Jefferson County - and that’s reflected in this week’s drought report, as well.

This week, the drought monitor listed most of Drew County and portions of Bradley, Cleveland, Desha and Lincoln counties as being in “severe” drought.

“We’ve gotten rain,” said Drew County Office of Emergency Management Director Michael Frisby. “But it’s been spotty showers that pop up. It’d be a downpour for a few minutes, and I was, like, ‘Where’d that come from?’ And then it’d quit.”

Frisby said firefighters battled flames in a field south of Monticello on Wednesday, but high humidity helped get it in check.

“It got away and burned a couple of acres,” he said. “But it didn’t spread.”

He said that although Drew County Judge Robert Akin has not issued a burn ban for that county, he is asking residents to notify police or the Arkansas Forestry Commission’s Monticello office before burning anything.

“We’ll see smoke, and if we don’t know what it is, we’ll send firefighters,” he said. “We don’t want to split our resources out if there’s not a fire.

“A lot of us are on edge from last year,” he said, referring to 2012’s much drier conditions and numerous fires that burned across the county.

Drought conditions also worsened in Lafayette County, but farmers are at present glad for the lack of rain, saidOllie Jean Kelner, owner of the Bradley AG Store in Bradley.

“Right now it’s good,” Kelner said. “We’re pretty blessed. The soybeans are even knee high now. They look pretty doggone good. We could use a good rain for the pastures, but it needs to hold off a week so our farmers can get their corn in.

“You can’t get it perfect for everybody.”

In Yell County, farmers are pleased and stunned by the amount of hay they harvested this season because of the better drought conditions, said Yell County extensionagent Jack Clark.

“One of our cattle producers said he was looking at his fourth cutting of hay,” Clark said. “He’d been farming for 60 years and said he’s never remembered getting four full cuttings in a year.”

Early spring rains helped hay production, but it hindered rice farmers, Clark said.

“The crops slowed down a bit,” he said. “Rice won’t be harvested until late October or early November. Usually, we get rice in in late September.

“We just can’t get it both ways,” Clark said. “I’d rather see the cold, moist weatherthan the drought though. The drought’s more harmful.”

Robinson said long-range forecasts don’t show much rain for southern Arkansas.

“It’s turned around from last year,” Robinson said, referring to dry conditions the northern half of the state. “We had rain in the north and dry in the south. I don’t see that changing.

“It looks pretty unlikely they will even get widespread rain down there anytime soon,” he said. “We’re afraid if they don’t get some rain, we’ll see larger areas of ‘severe’ drought ahead for them.”

Northwest Arkansas, Pages 9 on 08/23/2013