Northwest Iowa — Recent rains have given some hope that Iowa will pull out of the drought conditions that weren’t helped by a drier than normal spring.
DNR hydrologist, Tim Hall, says some areas saw several inches of rain in a short time, which he says is good, even if a lot of it ran off the ground without sinking in.
He says there weren’t any reports of significant flash flooding, which is a good indicator of just how dry it is.
Hall says the impact was immediate on some of the waterways that have restrictions on them for irrigation.
He says we need more consistent rains at about one inch each week.
The most recent Drought Monitor that came out on Thursday, July 11th showed the eastern half of Osceola county, as well as the northeastern quarter of O’Brien county classified as “Abnormally Dry”. It shows all of Sioux county, the western half of Osceola county, the southwestern 3/4 of O’Brien county, and all but extreme northwest Lyon county classified as “Moderate Drought”, and the very extreme northwest portion of Lyon county as “Severe Drought”.
The thunderstorms the four county area saw last week put a lot of rainfall into gages throughout the counties, and will likely have made the drought situation better when they show up in the US Drought Monitor which will be published on Thursday.
