US Drought Monitor and Summary, 2-28-17

An inch to 2 inches of rain fell across parts of southern Arkansas and northeast Louisiana this week, but generally less than a tenth of an inch to no precipitation occurred across most of the rest of the South. D0 was shaved in southwest Oklahoma to reflect heavy precipitation from previous weeks which wasn’t accounted for last week. But expansion of D0-D2 occurred across parts of Oklahoma and Texas. Feb. 27 USDA reports indicated that topsoil moisture was short or very short (dry to very dry) across 42 percent of Oklahoma and 33 percent of Texas, and subsoil moisture was short or very short across 43 percent of Oklahoma and 30 percent of Texas. Pasture and rangeland were in poor to very poor condition across 37 percent of Oklahoma and 20 percent of Texas, while some crops were suffering at this early stage. In Oklahoma, 21 percent of the canola, 27 percent of the oats, and 15 percent of the winter wheat were in poor to very poor condition. Read more at droughtmonitor.unl.edu…