Severe drought leads to loss of root tissue.
Permanent loss of leaves and roots greatly reduce the tree’s ability to recover, even when moisture is restored.
Dead and dying trees provide ideal habitat for Ips engraver beetles.
Immediate damage from this drought is evidenced by dying tree tops, brown leaves and dropping needles.
Long-term damage to root systems is likely.
During the next two to three years, both hardwoods and pines will die due to root damage suffered during this drought.
In the initial Ips outbreak report on Nov. 22, 2016, it was stated that sound management practices such as thinning are normally key to maintaining stand vigor and health in the prevention of bark beetle infestations.
However, the Georgia Forestry Commission recommends that with abnormal drought conditions and a greater amount of stressed trees observed, normal stand management practices should be reconsidered.
Time will be required for forest stands to recover to a healthy and vigorous condition, capable of withstanding natural and human-caused stresses.
Landowners managing forested property are encouraged to work with a professional forester, monitor stands for insects and disease, determine soil moisture and overall stand conditions, and minimize additional stress factors.

Supervisors to get drought update.
Tulare County, and more specifically East Porterville, became ground zero for the drought the past three years.
More than 1,200 residences across the county reported wells going dry, with a good chunk of those in East Porterville where hundreds of families were left without water.
Last week, Gov.
Jerry Brown declared the drought over in the Golden State, with the exception of Tulare County and three other counties where efforts are still underway to help people impacted by the drought.
Tuesday’s presentation during the regular board meeting of the supervisors is intended to provide direction as to whether to continue the county’s drought-relief efforts or to begin demobilization of the County’s California Disaster Assistance Act-funding activities, including the mobile showers, tank sites and Household Tank Program.
– Will look to establish an ad-hoc committee to evaluate a redesign of the Capitol Display for Tulare County inside the state capitol.
The board will meet at 9 a.m. in board chambers at 2800 W. Burrel Ave. in Visalia.

Lack of rain over the autumn, winter and early spring has left some rivers and reservoirs,particularly in the south and west, with dwindling levels.
Until now water companies have played down talk of hosepipe bans, but as the dry weather continues the public has now been warned that restrictions could be on the way in some areas unless reservoir levels are replenished by prolonged rainfall.
Water supplier Affinity, which covers large areas of the south-east of England, says it is "monitoring the situation closely with clear plans in place".
"January to March saw rainfall 50 to 70 per cent below average in our region" the company said.
"We have not seen the rise in groundwater levels we expected, and some rivers have seen flows decrease."
A spokesman for Southern Water said: "The winter of 2016-2017 was drier than average, particularly in the months leading up to Christmas.
Water companies say work has started with farmers to reduce the impact of the continuing dry weather as summer approaches.
Environment Agency spokesman George Leigh said some rivers, ground waters and reservoirs are lower than normal for the time of year.
But South East Water’s head of water resources Lee Dance said that while the winter has been drier than usual, the company does not envisage water shortages this summer.
"A continued lack of rainfall could lead to water restrictions."

Drought drives Kenyan pastoralists into Uganda.
Tens of thousands of pastoralists fled from Turkana in Kenya to Uganda last week to escape the drought.
It is the latest blow for the parched region for which politicians once made rash promises of rapid modernization.
As many as 10,000 Kenyan pastoralists have crossed the border from Turkana in Kenya to Uganda in search of pasture and water for their cattle.
Hunger and no rain The end of March was supposed to bring rains to Turkana, transforming barren plains into pasture.
"The image of Kenya as a middle income country doesn’t do justice to the reality on the ground," Werner Schultink, country head for the UN children’s agency UNICEF, told AFP.
"Those changes don’t happen in five years, but in 20, at least."
Oil and water That didn’t stop the promises.
In 2013, Kenya and the UN cultural body UNESCO announced the discovery of large reserves of groundwater beneath Turkana that promised irrigation and enough water for all.
Three million people are in need of emergency humanitarian assistance, and, while the response has been more effective than the last time, in 2011, still more needs to be done, aid workers say.

Steve Orr New York — with only four twisters in the last two years — is in a tornado drought.
Instead, each of the last two summers have brought just two short-lived, relatively weak tornadoes.
The first four months of 2017 already is the fifth-most tornadic such period on record.
In other such years, there have been quite a few twisters here.
On average, New York has recorded 7.7 tornadoes each summer in the modern tornado record, which dates to 1990.
In the 10 years with the heaviest activity nationwide in the spring, we’ve had an average of 7.2 tornadoes.
"There’s no real good prediction for tornado and severe weather events across New York state.
Tornadoes in upstate New York form when a warm front brings winds and hot, moist air to the region, Thomas said.
If the low-level jet stream is passing over the region, it can impart the energy and winds necessary to turn a thunderstorm into a tornado.
At other times, such conditions are rare in New York — and so are twisters.

He plans to keep the habits he picked up during the drought, he says.
“A year ago, I was saying that the drought had gone on for so long by recent historical standards that it was going to have a lasting impact on the way people thought about water conservation,” he says.
She stopped washing her car and watering her lawn.
“Even though I feel your personal use at an individual level has a nonexistent impact on the drought in California, it still has to be about people buying in,” Ms. Herren says.
But even some who don’t see themselves as especially eco-conscious have come out of the drought convinced that California will need to conserve for years to come.
“[Water] was so plentiful for so long that people got in the habit of washing their cars and letting the water run down the driveway and into the gutter.
“There should be conservation.
The framework recommends permanently banning wasteful practices such as watering lawns after rains and requiring water suppliers across the state to regularly report their water usage and conservation efforts.
“What this is about is how to be more efficient moving forward, so we’re more resilient in the face of climate change.” Some doubt that residents will keep conserving water, especially as rains flood parts of northern California and reveal extensive damage to the state’s water infrastructure.
Once formed, Marcus says, habits are hard to break.

Wetlands at risk from federal rule change: “The federal government’s Clean Water Act includes dozens of regulations to reduce water pollution.
… ” Read more from the PPIC Blog here: Wetlands at risk from federal rule change 100% Wrong!
Some of the discussion points are presented in this post, with my comments.
Now, by many accounts, the drought is over for much of the state.
… ” Read more from The Confluence Blog here: Extreme precipitation and water storage in California Accounting for water in the San Joaquin Valley: “Accounting for water supplies and uses is fundamental to good water management, but it is often difficult and controversial to implement.
I discussed these and related topics for the San Joaquin River fall-run salmon in a post on February 13.
In a March 1 post on its daily blog, the California Department of Fish and Wildlife predicted poor salmon runs this year: … ” Read more from the California Fisheries Blog here: Sacramento River fall-run salmon: status and future State double-feature is for the birds: “Though it’s one of the most altered landscapes in the west, the northern San Joaquin Valley still retains remnants of its marvelous natural history.
… ” Read more from The Valley Citizen here: State double-feature is for the birds Oroville’s impact on Lake Mead: “Friday’s announcement of an 85 percent California State Water Project allocation was, tentatively at least, good news for Lake Mead.
The Trump administration official said he and the governor discussed “public lands, water infrastructure and projects throughout California” that are managed by the Department of Interior.
… ” Read more from the Inkstain blog here: The paradoxes of irrigation efficiency Sign up for daily email service and you’ll never miss a post!

What a difference!
How drought-buster winter has changed NorCal.
Jerry Brown declared earlier this month, but it’s too early to parade in our rain, scientists say.
The thing about record droughts is that they take a long time to recover from.
"The odds of the state completely recovering from its extreme dryness within two years are estimated at less than 1 percent," said Dr. Eugene R. Wahl, paleoclimatologist and lead author of the study for the National Centers for Environmental Information of the NOAA.
So despite a wetter-than-average winter, areas that suffered the worst during the dry spell may need decades to recover, scientists say.
Some locations are more than 8 feet behind in rainfall.
Most of Northern and interior California has seen a short-term replenishment of lakes and reservoirs, but long-term recovery is not a sure thing.
Still, the much higher water levels are a strong first step, as the above gallery shows.
Click to see what dramatic changes the wet winter has made to Northern California.

Desalination plant, reservoir helping Tampa Bay endure Florida’s fiery drought.
The board, also known as Swiftmud, is expected next week to declare a phase one water order.
In the Tampa Bay area, a drought such as this one used to mean pumping more water from the aquifer to replace the lack of rain.
Now that Tampa Bay Water has built a desalination plant and a 15 billion gallon reservoir, the region can handle a drought without damaging the environment, according to chief technical officer Alison Adams.
Those controversial and, at times, trouble-prone facilities give the Tampa Bay region an advantage over most of Florida in responding to the prolonged drought and resulting wildfires.
This year’s dry season across Florida ranks as one of the driest on record, according to state climatologist David Zierden.
The utility’s predecessor, the West Coast Regional Water Supply Authority, was mired in lawsuits because it drew too much water from underground, drying up lakes, swamps and private wells.
During droughts back then, she said, "we would just pump harder on everything" causing serious damage throughout the region.
Since December the desal plant has been pumping from 15 million to 18 million gallons of water a day to slake the region’s thirst in a time of little rainfall, Adams said.
But now, Tampa Bay Water said, the desal plant and reservoir are all functioning.

Small businesses, agricultural cooperatives and aquaculture farms have less than a month to apply for federal assistance due to the recent drought, which hasn’t entirely ended despite recent rain and snow.
May 15 is the filing deadline for federal economic injury disaster loans in New Hampshire as a result of the drought that began on Jan. 1, 2016.
Ironically, while the northern half of the state has recovered from the drought, the southern half continues to show drought conditions, as state climatologist Mary Stampone mentioned at a meeting of the New Hampshire Drought Management Team last week.
The problem is that groundwater supplies, which take time to be recharged, have not recovered from a year of below-average rainfall and above-average temperatures.
There are increasing signs that another El Nino, the Pacific Ocean phenomenon that shapes weather throughout the continent, is forming.
The last El Nino was associated with New Hampshire’s 2016 drought.
Under the federal Small Business Administration declaration, the Economic Injury Disaster Loan program is available to farm-related and nonfarm-related entities, including nurseries.
Except for aquaculture enterprises, SBA cannot provide disaster loans to agricultural producers, farmers or ranchers.
The loans are for working capital and can be up to $2 million with interest rates of 4 percent for eligible small businesses and 2.625 percent for nonprofit organizations, and terms up to 30 years.
Applicants may apply online using the electronic loan application via SBA’s website at disasterloan.sba.gov/ela, or by calling the SBA’s customer service center at 800-659-2955 or by sending an email to disastercustomerservice@sba.gov.