‘A humanitarian crisis’: Local group raising money to ward off famine in drought-stricken Somalia.
In April, the Somali Community Development of North Dakota in Fargo formed an 11-member drought committee and raised $21,000 for famine and drought relief in Somalia.
When the Islamic holy month of Ramadan was approaching, the drought in Somalia remained deadly, and members of the local Somali community knew it was time to step up again.
Adbullahi, a drought committee member, said when Ramadan began on May 26, the committee added three more members and set into motion a second wave of fundraising.
Adbullahi said the Somali community wanted to raise money to help the people in Somalia who couldn’t afford food for iftar.
Each week, Hashim and Hassan send the money to the Somali National Drought Committee in Mogadishu, Somalia.
Hassan, translated by local drought committee member Abdiwalli Sharif, explained that there is a high need for donations during this drought.
Fowzia Adde, a drought committee member, shared the story of her uncle, who already struggled through a drought that claimed the lives of three of his four children in 2011.
Adde said the drought committee’s goal is to raise more money than in April.
After raising money throughout Ramadan, the drought committee plans to continue fighting for a solution to the droughts in Somalia.

What Did California Learn From The Drought?.
Mike Jenson / Merced Irrigation District A report from the Public Policy Institute of California says the state’s cities and suburbs responded well to the unprecedented mandate to cut water use by 25 percent during the drought.
The PPIC says by some measures, the state’s water conservation requirement was a success.
But report authors call the mandate a “blunt instrument” that increased tension between the state and local water agencies.
Instead, the report notes the strategy state regulators implemented near the end of the drought was more appropriate.
The so-called "stress test" required local agencies prove they had enough water for three dry years.
The PPIC says this "trust but verify" tactic served both the state and urban and suburban water suppliers.
"There’s no way in a state as large and geographically diverse as California, that the state, from Sacramento, is going to be in a position to know better than the local managers what the conditions are locally.” Hanak says water supply data that local agencies had to collect and submit to the state was another positive outcome.
It provides both a good way to measure water use over the long-term and provides a better baseline for analyzing conservation during drought.
“This is just a good piece of data that’s not very costly,” says Hanak.

The drought in the Dakotas may expand in the weeks ahead, according to the latest U.S. Drought Monitor Outlook.
“Currently, the primary area of concern is in the Dakotas,” the outlook says.
Some indicators point toward cooler and possibly wetter weather in the region for the last half of the month, but at this point it seems only a possibility; however, it does reduce our forecast confidence somewhat.” DROUGHT OUTLOOK: The drought is likely to expand in June, according to the latest U.S. Drought Monitor Outlook.
North Dakota hotline activated North Dakota Agriculture Commissioner Doug Goehring recently announced a new hotline available for ranchers affected by the drought.
They will then be entered into the Drought Hotline database to be matched up with other individuals.
Goehring said North Dakota Department of Agriculture employees will answer calls to the hotline weekdays from 8 a.m. to 5 p.m. Callers can also leave a message on evenings and weekends.
Lack of measurable rain combined with higher temperatures and wind have caused drought conditions across the state in varying degrees.
Pasture and range conditions were rated 70% fair to very poor, which could cut forage production dramatically for livestock producers even if rains were to come in late June.
“We are requesting that the Farm Service Agency allow emergency haying and grazing of Conservation Reserve Progam land,” Goehring said.
“Once a disaster declaration is attained, farmers and ranchers should check with their local FSA office to see if they qualify for other drought relief programs that may be available to help.” Related

ABERDEEN | Continued drought-like conditions in South Dakota could dampen the high hopes many biologists had for the pheasant population earlier this spring when the nesting period began.
"Some birds potentially start nesting in late April if the conditions are right, but from mid-May through the first 10 days of June is the big-time period," he said.
"Then, after that until the end of June, you’ll start coming across hens that are re-nesting."
"Going into the nesting season we were looking pretty good — everybody was seeing birds everywhere if there was habitat available," he said.
Pheasants’ ideal nesting weather is moderate or warm temperatures with sufficient rainfall.
Lenihan said rainfall is important in helping grow cool-season grasses, which are necessary for nesting cover and insect production.
Lenihan said that if lack of rain stunts grass growth, predators on the ground and in the sky can more easily find eggs and baby chicks.
"To survive, pheasant chicks really need two things: good cover and a food source.
Right now the habitat is looking OK. We haven’t hit a critical point yet, but we need to get some rain before too long, because we don’t, as the weeks progress it will start having an effect on our bird numbers."
"But we sure could use some rain."

A dry winter and growing season was challenging for vines in the Cape wine regions Old vines, likes these for Alheit winery, fared better in a dry year in the Cape wine regions.
South African vintners dealt with an extremely dry growing season in 2017, resulting in a small crop.
Both vintages made very concentrated wine, just different in nature."
"Nighttime temperatures were cooler and this resulted in higher acid retention," said Adam Mason, winemaker at Mulderbosch.
"We had to start irrigation in December before veraison.
The cooler days and nights resulted in slower sugar accumulation but the phenolics kept developing.
It was unique to see phenolic ripeness at lower sugar levels."
"The old vines were fabulous this year.
The crops were decent and the fruit very healthy and flavorful."
In the end, the producers say the wines are showing ripeness and concentration.

SD farmers worry about crops as drought conditions continue.
(NBC News) – Dry conditions in South Dakota have prompted Governor Dennis Daugaard to activate the State Drought Task Force and farmers across the state can’t get a break from the sunshine.
It started out good for lifelong Miller farmer JD Wangsness.
This year had the makings of a good one with calving and getting crops in the ground.
The lack of moisture, the duration of time it has been since we’ve had moisture."
Wangsness said, "If it starts to rain, I don’t think we would come up with as good of crop as we normally would.
But until we get some rain, it’s just sitting there not doing a lot."
Plus, you lose your factories so it’s not the best thing to be doing."
Going forward, the only thing farmers like Wangsness can do, is hope for a little help from mother nature.
Just plan for the worst and hope for the best."

Fendrich on Tennis: Slam drought done, Nadal heads to grass.
Probably I was playing good, too, no?"
But not only here," said Wawrinka, a three-time major champion, including at the 2015 French Open.
There’s no rest for the weary: Play begins at the next major, Wimbledon, just three weeks from Monday.
And Nadal?
"When Rafael is good with his knees," Toni said, "he can play well on the grass."
Nadal won Wimbledon twice, in 2008 and 2010.
A reporter wanted to know whether, during that time, Nadal harbored any doubts about returning to the heights of his sport.
During that three years, I had doubts.
Right now, I’m going to have doubts even in a few days, because in tennis, every week is a new story."

Aid groups seek to turn on funding tap to douse drought crises.
BARCELONA/HARARE (Thomson Reuters Foundation) – When a big earthquake, flash flood or other sudden disaster hits, aid agencies spring into action with emergency responses and public appeals for donations.
Hunger kicks in only after crops fail, food stocks are exhausted and livestock start dying – but by then, help often comes too late to head off the worst.
The Start Network, funded by the British, Dutch and Irish governments, is putting together a new financing facility to enable a faster and more coordinated response to droughts, and plans to test its model in Pakistan and Zimbabwe.
In May, the network convened local and international agencies in Harare to discuss how it might work in the southern African nation still smarting from a devastating 2015-2016 drought, driven by the El Nino climate pattern, which left some 4 million people in need of food aid.
"We realized humanitarian responses were not kicking in fast," said Emily Montier, manager of the drought project for the Start Network.
Montier said many aid groups responding to drought had tried to access the Start Network’s existing fund for swift relief in small-scale crises, but it backs 45-day projects which is too short for drawn-out situations like droughts.
With little help at hand, poor families are forced to sell off their cattle and other meager assets to survive.
"The government agencies do not have any plan so far to respond to drought," said Arif.
With work near completion on web-based scientific models to calculate drought risks and potential funding options, the Start Network is talking to donor governments about funding the next stage of implementing the facility in Pakistan and Zimbabwe.

The western-most region of the continental United States set records for low snowpack levels in 2015 and scientists, through a new study, point the finger at high temperatures, not the low precipitation characteristic of past “snow drought” years. The study suggests greenhouse gases were a major contributor to the high temperatures, which doesn’t bode well for the future, according to authors of a new study published in the journal Geophysical Research Letters. In 2015, more than 80 percent of the snow measurement sites in the region — comprised of California, Oregon, Washington, western Nevada and western Idaho — experienced record low snowpack levels that were a result of much warmer-than-average temperatures. Most of the previous records were set in 1977, when there just wasn’t enough moisture to generate snow, according to Philip Mote, director of the Oregon Climate Change Research Institute at Oregon State University and lead author on the study. “The 2015 snowpack season was an extreme year,” Mote said. “But because of the increasing influence of greenhouse gases, years like this may become commonplace over the next few decades.” Impacts of the snow drought in California, Oregon and Washington led the governors of those states to order reductions in water use and saw many ski areas, particularly those in lower elevations, struggle. California has been in a drought since 2011 and this multi-year period of low precipitation, by some measures, is the state’s most severe in 500…

Senckenberg scientists have studied the impact of old forest roads on the species diversity in the rainforest of Central Guyana. They reached the conclusion that the established roads may be of use for amphibians and should therefore not necessarily be closed or restored to their natural state. For example, ruts in the roads filled with accumulated water can serve as spawning grounds for frogs during dry periods. The study was recently published in the scientific journal Frontiers in Ecology and the Environment. Brown corridors traversing the otherwise lush green: As a rule, roads that cut through the rainforest are not a pleasant sight. “We have now studied the impact of such forest roads on the species diversity among amphibians,” explains Dr. Raffael Ernst of the Senckenberg Natural History Collections in Dresden, and he continues, “In doing so, we have moved from the bird’s-eye view to the frog’s perspective. Among other things, the international team of scientists around Ernst intended to find out whether the ecological restoration of the roads would be a sensible measure in terms of the preservation of…