Water is not the limitless natural resource it appears to be when a faucet, sprinkler or irrigation system is turned on.
As evidence, consider Taghvaeian’s recent research on previous droughts in Oklahoma and their impact on irrigated agriculture.
“In parts of the state that have access to groundwater they can pump during drought, it’s usually a more rapid decline of water resources during drought years,” Taghvaeian said.
“It’ll impact the future of that water resource and its availability in that region.” Particularly in the case of groundwater resources, which are harder to quantify because they are below the surface, Taghvaeian said people should think of it like a savings account.
“You learn that’s just part of nature.
However, the advent and evolution of long-range weather forecasting has been critical in helping Kinder manage the operation, including during times of drought.
For instance, Kinder has a good idea of his crop rotations a year in advance and the long-range weather forecasts play a role in those determinations.
For others who live and work outside agriculture circles, drought obviously takes on a very different meaning.
“Generally, they don’t feel the impact immediately like a farmer or water manager might,” said McManus.
“Our producers are well aware of the value of our natural resources.

Hydrologists describe flash drought like flash flooding – it happens really quick, and then it’s over.
So what’s the difference between flash drought and normal drought?
The main difference is temperature.
Flash droughts occur when it heats up quickly.
East New Mexico and a few locations in the Texas panhandle saw abnormally warm temperatures in March while waiting for rain.
National Weather Service Hydrologist Royce Fontenot describes it like this: "someone’s turned up the heat, turned off the water" and that’s how you get flash drought.
Normal drought lasts for long periods of time, sometimes months and years.
Meteorologists we spoke to today said they hadn’t heard of flash drought, and it seems to be a relatively new phenomenon.
What’s the solution?
Just like normal drought, you need rain to end a flash drought.

Drought in ArkLaTex could lead to flash flooding with next storm system.
Seems that all we are getting are storms, usually severe with locally heavy rain.
However, despite the pattern, we are in a slight to moderate drought.
It’s almost a shocker that we have gotten only 5.59 inches leaving us with 7.35 inches deficit.
Texarkana fares a bit better with 11.32 inches of rain as of last Friday, which is very close to where they should be: 11.44 inches.
If we have another storm event it could bring some heavy rain of 2-4 inches with isolated higher amounts.
And, while it will help our rain deficit, it can cause a nightmare for motorists as well as freshly tilled gardens.
On roadways, never try to drive through flooded areas.
One life saver is a weather radio to alert you of severe weather.
Also, a great weather safety tool is our KSLA StormTracker 12 Weather App on your smartphone and portable devices.

MUMBAI (Reuters) – Sugar output in Tamil Nadu, one of India’s main sugar producing states, is likely to fall by more than a third in the new season beginning October, hit by the worst drought in more than a century.
Tamil Nadu, India’s fourth biggest sugar producer, is likely produce 600,000 tonnes in the 2017/18 season, down from around 1 million tonnes in the current season to September 2017, M. Manickam, executive chairman of Sakthi Sugars, said.
Tamil Nadu’s sugar mills produced 1.36 million tonnes of sugar in 2015/16.
The drought has also hit other parts of southern India, forcing hundreds of farmers to travel to New Delhi to protest and seek government help.
Sugar producers from Tamil Nadu, hit by the drought and saddled with big debts, put live rats in their mouths and carried the skulls of farmers believed to have committed suicide at a New Delhi protest last week, calling on Prime Minister Narendra Modi to save them from starvation.
The farmers, protesting near parliament in New Delhi, suffered crop losses last year, and they had to take on more loans to survive.
India as a whole will produce 20.3 million tonnes of sugar in the year to September 2017, the Indian Sugar Mills Association said last month, 5 percent lower than a previous forecast.
In the last two years, back-to-back droughts have ravaged the cane crop in the western state of Maharashtra, the country’s top sugar producer.
The monsoon, which delivers 70 percent of India’s annual rainfall, is critical for the country’s farmers and their rice, cane, corn, cotton and soybean crops because nearly half of its farmland lacks irrigation.
Other than sugar, Tamil Nadu’s cotton production in 2016/17 is likely to fall by 21 percent to 550,000 bales, according to the Cotton Association of India.

Kenya’s tourism industry and conservation efforts are being threatened by drought-induced violence.
On the night of Mar.
29, suspected herdsmen burnt an exclusive safari lodge owned by prominent Italian-born, Kenyan author and conservationist Kuki Gallmann.
The raid was the latest in a series of attacks on private properties in drought-stricken Laikipia.
Over the last few months, cattle herders have invaded luxury lodges, ranches, and conservancies in search of fresh pasture for their herds.
Kenya is one of the several east African nations affected by a harsh drought, with the Red Cross stating that three million Kenyans are in need of emergency food aid.
The spike in attacks has also left a bloody trail, with a dozen people dead, including mothers and children.
Tristan Voorspuy, a dual Kenyan and British national, was also found dead in early March after he ventured to inspect burnt houses on the Sosian safari lodge.
Residents and ranch owners say the attacks against them have intensified after the government recently deployed the military to quell the violence.
Cattle herders have also blamed the government for reportedly shooting on hundreds of their livestock grazing these ranches.

Another year, another Timberwolves’ missed playoff appearance.
Finishing in the bottom half of the Western Conference to miss the playoffs for 13 consecutive years seems like a nearly impossible feat.
Minnesota’s current drought is the longest active streak in the NBA and the second-longest drought in league history, trailing only the Clippers’ 15-year playoff hiatus that stretched from the late 1970s to the early 1990s.
After years of accruing high draft picks, a franchise is bound to stumble into a top eight finish at least once in a decade.
A couple picks turned out well, such as Kevin Love, who Minnesota acquired in a draft night trade in 2008, and Ricky Rubio, the No.
5 overall pick in 2009.
Cassell averaged 17 points a game the following season to lead the Clippers to their first playoff appearance since 1997.
Dwane Casey led the Timberwolves to a 20-20 record through the first 40 games of the 2006-07 campaign.
Never since has Minnesota finished a season with a .500-record of better.
Casey’s firing was just one example of Minnesota’s coaching carousel over the past 13 years.

New Mexico hit by ‘flash drought’ weather phenomenon.
ALBUQUERQUE – Across New Mexico, unusually warm March weather and virtually no rain for a month prompted dust storms that closed highways, warnings for some to stay inside and rapid mountain snow melting that could threaten drinking water supplies and farmers’ irrigation needs.
This weather phenomenon – driven by a quick increase in temperatures and a lack of precipitation resulting in bone-dry soil – is called a flash drought.
In New Mexico, the flash drought is ending as quickly as it began because of the recent arrival of rain.
That left a swath of New Mexico’s eastern plains and parts of the Rio Grande Valley in central and southern New Mexico with no moisture in the soil’s top lawyers.
“Things went dry and went dry very fast,” Fontenot said.
Flash droughts typically aren’t severe, but Fontenot said the level of damage that ensues depends on when the phenomenon strikes.
The dry, windy conditions also fueled devastating wildfires in the Texas Panhandle, charring hundreds of square miles and killing four people.
The warm weather prompted faster-than-normal snowmelt atop New Mexico mountains that supply key drinking water supplies and irrigation resources for farmers.
It’s also expected to persist in southwestern Arizona and in parts of southern California as well as parts of Colorado and Oklahoma.

Local farmer affected by drought conditions, plans ahead for future.
A local farmer Daren Niemeyer tells NTV, at the beginning of the year was definitely a dry season.
"Last year and now the year before that we had a little closer to average rain, but for the last quite a few years you know it’s been more dry years than wet years.” Niemeyer said you never know what mother nature will bring, so it’s always good to have a strategy.
"A plan ahead, I mean some of the crops would grow some of the practices that we use kind of fight against drought,” Niemeyer said.
This past winter he says he had a lot of issues with planting.
The cold temperatures you know actually kill a plant,” Niemeyer said.
"Right now we’re an abnormally dry.
Berg said recent spring showers could bring farmers the moisture they’ve been wanting.
"We started getting the systems that would come through more routinely and that’s what we have had the last couple of weeks is precipitation off and on,” Berg said.
Niemeyer hopes to see more rain the future.

But part of it, too, is because of Opening Day struggles that have kept the Twins from a positive start to the season every year since 2008, failing to win their first game eight years in a row.
“Everybody is in first place right now.
Regardless of the start that we get off to, we’re confident that we’re going to be a pretty good team.” In manager Paul Molitor’s two seasons at the helm, one of the few consistencies has been early season struggles.
“As much as last year sticks in the craw of some of our people, it doesn’t guarantee that you can go out there and say, ‘Lightning is not going to strike twice,’” Molitor said.
“We have to have the mindset from day one of how important games are early.
They all count.
I think we’re better prepared this year as far as potentially being able to handle the ups and downs that the game brings either personally or as a team.
I think those things will help us eliminate some of those longer droughts where we had trouble putting wins on the board.” The Twins haven’t won on Opening Day since a 2008 victory when Livan Hernandez threw seven strong innings, Joe Nathan earned the save, and Justin Morneau hit cleanup in front 49,596 fans at the Metrodome.
They’ve lost both their season opener and home opener the last five years.
Even in his first few months with the Twins, chief baseball officer Derek Falvey has heard about the early season struggles that have plagued this team.

Jayski.com: Race Recap: Brad Keselowski ends Ford drought with Martinsville victory.
The car maker found Victory Lane at the .526-mile short track for the first time since Oct. 20, 2002, when Kurt Busch won at NASCAR’s oldest and smallest premier series track in a Roush Fenway Racing Ford.
Keselowski and runner-up Kyle Busch swapped the lead during the final 64-lap green-flag run, with Busch taking the point on Lap 444 of 500, and Keselowski powering back past Busch’s No.
The guys that run well everywhere run well here, and it’s really just an honor to win here and get to compete here.
"This track is 70 years old and a lot of legends have won here.
It feels great to be able to join them and bring home a (grandfather) clock (trophy).
The victory was Keselowski’s 23rd in the Monster Energy NASCAR Cup Series, and it vaulted him into the playoff points lead with 10.
In the series standings, Keselowski leaves Martinsville in fourth place, 34 points behind leader Kyle Larson and 30 behind second-place Chase Elliott, who parlayed a front-row starting position into a third-place finish.
Busch, who led a race-high 274 laps to Keselowski’s 116, was disappointed that the performance of his Camry fell off after his final pit stop on Lap 336.
(Crew chief) Adam (Stevens) and the guys did an awesome job on this car this weekend to get it to where it was.