Drought has been declared for much of Northwest Oklahoma following another dry week in the region, U.S Drought Monitor is reporting.
"A dry week for the region, but also a very cold week, with most of the eastern portions of the region recording temperatures 5 to10 degrees below normal," according to a report for the High Plains region, which includes Oklahoma.
"Dryness over the last 3 months has been a concern, even during the fall and winter months."
The lack of precipitation and continued cold have led to drought declarations across the region.
"Moderate drought conditions were expanded over all of eastern Colorado, western Kansas and more of central Kansas," according to the report.
"Severe drought was also expanded over southwest Kansas while a new area of extreme drought was introduced along the Oklahoma border where less than 10 percent of normal precipitation has been recorded over the last 90 days."
Extreme drought has been declared in parts of Beaver, Major and Alfalfa counties.
Most of Woodward County is also included in the extreme drought, as well as all of Woods and Harper counties.
The majority of Major and Alfalfa counties are classified as under severe drought, according to U.S. Drought Monitor.
Portions of Garfield and Grant counties are under severe drought, but the majority of both counties are under moderate drought.

The weather has been very dry over the last few months in Colorado, and drought conditions are expanding.
New data released Thursday by the National Drought Mitigation Center shows Denver in Moderate Drought for the first time since May of 2017.
December and January are the two driest months for the Colorado Front Range, so this is no shocker, but most of our precipitation this time of year falls in the form of snow.
Drought conditions have returned to Denver.
First time since May.
State drought went from 34% to 76% in 1 week #9wx #COwx pic.twitter.com/teEHH2uCX9 — Cory Reppenhagen (@CReppWx) January 11, 2018 The Denver metro was also in Moderate Drought last January, and was elevated to Severe Drought by May 14.
That’s the interesting part of Colorado weather.
Being an arid climate, we don’t get to average levels by getting average precipitation.
So we will have to wait to see if we get a rescue from the weather, which is most likely in the spring climatologically speaking, but the long range forecast is not promising.
The La Nina is expected to last into the spring, which will increase the odds subsidence remaining prevalent in the western part of the United States.

Cape Town – In the last few days of the public comment period for the proposed drought charge, I would like to again inform and remind residents on why this proposal is being made and why it is needed.
The drought charge is needed to make up the deficit in the City’s revenue which has come about due to residents’ water savings and paying significantly less for water and sanitation.
As I have stated before when tabling the proposed drought charge to Council last year, it is not intended to be punitive.
Without this vital income, the City will not be able to undertake the basic operations required to provide water and sanitation services to the people of Cape Town.
This network also requires constant maintenance to ensure that water and sanitation services are supplied to consumers.
The income from the drought charge is needed to ensure that we can operate the reticulation network that supplies drinking water to residents.
A charge based on property valuations has been deemed the most progressive of the options, while being the most equitable and fair to poor households.
This is the fairest way to recover the City’s revenue shortfall by distributing the charge in such a way that those who can afford it will pay an amount based on their properties’ valuation.
It is important to note that the cost of running the water and sanitation network does not increase or decrease in proportion to the amount of water used or sold.
The proposed drought charge will be tabled at Council for its consideration at the end of January as part of the adjustments budget.

On Jan. 3, the snow level was only about 24 percent of average In a statement released by the California Department of Water Resources, Gehrke said the levels “seem a little gloomy,” but areas that had no snow a few weeks ago, now have a few patches.
State Climatologist Mike Anderson is hopeful there is still time for rainfall.
In a report published by The Earth Institute at Columbia University, satellite images provided by NOAA show parts of central California and all of southern California likely to have warmer temperatures in January through March of this year.
According to maps published by the United States Drought Mitigation Center, southern California is classified as a mix of “abnormally dry,” and “moderate drought” as of Jan. 4.
Not every part of California is completely dry, some state reservoirs have filled up more than their 2017 levels reported last year.
Lake Shasta, California’s largest surface reservoir, now holds 118 percent of its historical average, as of Jan. 3.
Roughly half of California’s water supply comes from so-called “atmospheric rivers,” which are like tunnels in the sky, transporting most of the water vapor out of the tropics.
These tunnels move with the weather and carry an amount of water vapor equivalent to the average flow of the mouth of the Mississippi River, NOAA officials said.
Doing laundry and showering use an average of 196 gallons of water per day, according to Save Our Water.
Currently, predictions are about 70 percent accurate, he says.

Cape Town mayor Patricia de Lille says her party’s decision not to support her administration’s proposed “drought charge” has caused confusion.
Speaking to TimesLIVE on Thursday during a visit to a Cape Flats aquifer drilling site in Mitchells Plain‚ De Lille said Twigg’s executive had not consulted the DA caucus before taking its decision.
“There is confusion there because the caucus of the DA had already taken a decision to support the drought charge.
From the DA caucus it went to council‚ where everybody in the DA caucus voted for that‚” she said.
“So the confusion really is‚ ‘how can you now go back and vote against your own decision?’
“Obviously the caucus can always go back and review‚ but as you have seen yesterday‚ that is not the official position of the full caucus.
De Lille’s future as mayor also hangs in the balance‚ with the DA national leadership due to decide on Sunday whether to keep her in the job.
A council meeting on January 31 is due to decide on the drought charge‚ which is intended to cover a R1.4-billion deficit in the city’s budget.
The levy is meant to be in place for four years and will affect 464‚000 households.
Asked what her administration would do if the drought charge was rejected‚ De Lille said: “We will have to then cut from other budgets from the city.”

DENVER (CBS4) – The weekly drought data was released Thursday morning and it’s not good.
99 percent of Colorado is now experiencing abnormal dryness or drought.
The percentage of the state with at least moderate drought has increased 42 percent from a week ago and now includes the entire Denver metro area.
Even worse, severe drought jumped 15 percent and now has a grip on nearly the entire Western Slope.
The data was calculated on Tuesday and therefore doesn’t include most of the moisture from our recent storm.
So it’s possible we could see limited improvement particularly in southwest Colorado next week.
But in terms of the metro area, the rain and snow we saw Wednesday is unlikely to make much of a difference.
As of this morning we’ve seen 6.8 inches of snow this season in Denver.
Ashton Altieri is a Certified Broadcast Meteorologist.
Watch him on the CBS4 Morning News weekdays from 4:30 a.m. to 7 a.m. Connect with Ashton on Facebook and on Twitter @AshtonCBS4.

Over the last 60 days, extensive areas of the country have recorded below 25 percent of normal precipitation, from the Southwest into the central Plains and Midwest as well as in the Southeast and into the Mid-Atlantic.
Most areas inland did not record any precipitation for the week, which continued the dry conditions that have been developing over the last 2-3 months.
Abnormally dry conditions were introduced into northwest and central Georgia as moderate drought conditions expanded over the western portions of the state.
No changes were made this week to the region as the impact of the precipitation in the region will be slow to materialize.
High Plains A dry week for the region, but also a very cold week, with most of the eastern portions of the region recording temperatures 5-10 degrees below normal.
South At the end of the current United States Drought Monitor period, the area from east Texas into southern Louisiana and southwest Mississippi recorded 1-2 inches of precipitation.
The dryness over the Texas and Oklahoma panhandle regions continued with an expansion of moderate and severe drought conditions this week and an introduction of extreme drought in Oklahoma.
Extreme drought also expanded in northern Texas.
Moderate drought and abnormally dry conditions were also expanded in portions of central, southern, and west Texas.
Drier than normal conditions are anticipated to mainly be over the areas of west Texas and southern New Mexico as well as along the coastal regions of the Southeast, with higher than normal chances of dry conditions along much of the east coast.

The government declared a national drought disaster early last year, with 23 out of 47 counties affected.
Northern Turkana Central, Turkana South, Turkana West, East Pokot, and Isiolo counties – also in Kenya’s so-called Arid and Semi-Arid Lands, known as ASAL – had GAM rates of between 15 and 29 percent.
Livestock, on which households in the underdeveloped ASAL areas depend, have also succumbed to the water shortages – dying in large numbers.
"Most of the communities we support as an organisation are pastoralists who solely rely on livestock for livelihoods.
They lost most of their livestock," Godfrey Wapangana, a programme officer at the aid agency World Vision, told IRIN.
That has reduced the availability of protein and milk, worsening nutritional levels, particularly among children.
That, coupled with an outbreak of the voracious Fall Army Worm pest, has seen wholesale staple food price increases of between eight and 32 percent above average in the urban markets of Nairobi, Mombasa, and Eldoret.
Some parts of Kenya have faced at least two consecutive years of failed rains leading to the current crisis.
As of December, out of a total of $205 million requested, donors had provided $86 million – 42 percent of needs.
The agency also says it has a shortfall of $24.6 million to cover its refugee operation to the end of May 2018.

Most parts of the Eastern Cape have experienced 2 years of below average annual rainfall, but the South African Weather Service has confirmed that the Uitenhage region has been the worst off with 5 years of below average rainfall.
Rainfall over the Eastern Cape for 2017 was generally dry.
This is in line with what international climate scientists have been projecting that global rainfall patterns will shift.
And these seasonal shifts affect water resources across the planet.
“The seasonal forecast does not look promising with only near normal rain forecast for most of the Eastern Cape,” said Garth Sampson, Client Liaison Officer (Eastern Cape) at the South African Weather Service.
“Considering the above and that the dam levels are fast approaching the 25% mark, it is vital that we all conserve water.” According to the weather service, the prolonged period of below average rainfall in areas of the Eastern Cape can be divided as follows: •East London, Grahamstown, Port Alfred, Port Elizabeth, Patensie and Joubertina have had 2 years of below average annual rainfall (2016-2017).
•Graaf Reinett and Cradock have experienced below average rainfall for 3 years (2015-2017).
•Mthatha and Somerset East have had 4 years of below average rainfall (2014-2017).
•Uitenhage, is the worst off with 5 years’ below average rainfall (2013-2017).
Here are some comparisons of average annual rainfall totals (first figure) and the 2017 actual rainfall (second figure) of towns in the Eastern Cape: Queenstown (442 mm – 550 mm), Mthatha (675 mm – 587 mm), Graaf Reinett (304 mm – 216 mm), Cradock (376 mm – 347 mm), Joubertina (394 mm – 207 mm), Patensie (459 mm – 340 mm), Uitenhage (423 mm – 315 mm), Port Elizabeth (616 mm – 494 mm), Port Alfred (585 mm – 485 mm), Grahamstown (523 mm – 504 mm), East London (834 mm – 807 mm).

Prolonged dry conditions have prompted the Government to declare a drought in two districts of the South Island’s West Coast.
They are the first South Island districts to be declared in drought this summer and follow parts of the lower North Island declared just before Christmas.
* Farmers pin hopes on rain forecast to hit South Island’s West Coast * Santa fails to deliver drought-breaking rain to lower North Island * First drought declared on West Coast * Dry spell prompts West Coast council to ask residents to conserve water An "extremely wet winter" left many farmers unable to grow pasture or crops for spring.
"We are keeping a watching brief on neighbouring areas."
It is the second time the Buller and Grey districts have been declared as being in drought – the first was in April 2013.
The National Institute of Water and Atmospheric Research (Niwa) figures show, as of 9am Tuesday, soil in much of the region was drier than normal.
On January 2, Reefton residents were placed on water restrictions due to "low reservoir levels and higher than normal usage", the Buller District Council said.
Other measures could include tax flexibility and income help.
The classification would last six months unless things changed substantially.
MetService issued forecast rain in Westland and Buller from overnight Wednesday to early Friday, and above-average rainfall across the West Coast for the rest of January.