Why New Hampshire’s drought was good for its moose.
Preliminary numbers from a project that puts tracking collars on moose show that only one of the calves – the most vulnerable group – died from winter ticks this year.
It was 71 last year.
Permits also are down to 80 in Vermont, from 165 last year.
Vermont, which joined the study this year and didn’t have drought issues as serious as New Hampshire, has seen five of its 30 collared calves die, so far.
The wildlife federation says it understands the Fish and Game Department’s goals to maintain a healthy moose population, as well as the challenges of trying to reopen a hunting season once it is stopped.
Some feel it’s time to stop moose hunting, period.
“Why would you threaten it further?” Moose population densities are taken into account in all hunting areas.
She said parasites are the bigger problem, and will continue to be so in the future.
… We could stop (hunting) tomorrow, and what’s going to happen to these animals will continue to happen.” Share

With drought easing, will Fresno get to turn on its sprinklers as often as Clovis?.
But at the end of this month, Fresno will change its water-use restrictions that limit customers to outdoor watering on only one day a week to something else – something yet undecided.
In Clovis, where some residents are separated from their Fresno neighbors by a city limit that runs down the middle of a street, the winter/spring change in rules happened on April 1, going from one-day-a-week watering to three days.
Conservation has always been an important part of our strategy; that’s not going to change.span Mark Standriff, city of Fresno spokesman In both Fresno and Clovis, twice-a-week watering was the result of state-mandated water conservation goals before those rules were eased last year if cities could show they had an ample supply.
“When we did two days a week, that’s when we were required to reduce water use by 36 percent,” said Lisa Koehn, assistant public utilities director for the city of Clovis.
Jerry Brown would declare an end to the California drought.
“Conservation has always been an important part of our strategy; that’s not going to change,” Standriff said.
Both Fresno and Clovis are counting on using their allocations of surface water from lakes in the Sierra to help them reduce their reliance on pumped groundwater.
Fresno has a surface water treatment plant in northeast Fresno that produces about 24 million gallons per day.
Winter schedule Rest of the year Fresno Dec. 1 – April 30: One day per week May 1 – Nov. 30: Two days per week* Clovis Nov. 1 – March 31: One day per week April 1 – Oct. 31: Three days per week *Pending possible changes Sources: City of Fresno; City of Clovis

“A lot of bad luck”: Drought and severe weather fuels record Oklahoma wildfires.
Wildfires fueled by gusting winds, hot, dry weather, and desiccated plant life have burned nearly 900,000 acres of Oklahoma so far this year, a record, as well as parts of Kansas and Texas.
But this season has been particularly active because of drought conditions that have creeped up during the winter, driven by record warm temperatures and a lack of precipitation.
Climate change is expected to impact many of the factors, such as precipitation, that can contribute to wildfires.
“A lot of bad luck” While this time of year is typically the main wildfire season for Oklahoma and surrounding areas, this season has seen a record-breaking amount of land scorched by 133 large wildfires ignited in the Panhandle and eastern Oklahoma, with conditions exacerbated by a perfect storm of ideal fire weather and a deepening drought.
That drought has developed due to a combination of exceptionally warm fall and winter temperatures and a lack of precipitation.
October through February was the warmest on record for Oklahoma; on Feb. 11, temperatures in Magnum, in the southwest of the state, hit 99°F (37°C), tying the highest winter temperature ever recorded in the state.
“That’s when we saw the large leap in drought conditions, when normally we wouldn’t see that,” state climatologist Gary McManus said.
Hot, dry, windy conditions are perfect for wildfires to develop, and that’s exactly what Oklahoma has periodically seen in recent weeks, first in the Panhandle and more recently across the eastern half of the state.
Future fire risk Like many other natural disasters that strike, this record fire activity raises the question of how climate change may impact wildfire risk in the future.

Brian Goetz, deputy director of the city of Portsmouth’s Public Works Department, explains how current water levels in the city and at the Bellamy Reservoir, the primary water supply for the city, have returned to satisfactory levels following last summer’s drought. [Rich Beauchesne/Seacoastonline] PORTSMOUTH — Drought conditions are slowly improving in southern New Hampshire, but experts say groundwater wells for towns and private residences could still have a ways to go before recharging back to normal. Much of Rockingham County, including Seacoast towns, dropped from being in a “severe” drought to a less-extreme “moderate” drought Thursday on the U.S. Drought Monitor at the University of Nebraska-Lincoln. “Moderate” is the second-least severe drought classification on the monitor, the least severe being “abnormally dry.” Drought experts and public works officials in the area say reservoirs should now be high enough to serve municipalities and water customers without issue this year, as surface water supplies recharge more easily in the winter than wells. They say groundwater wells, which rely on a thawed ground for precipitation to reach them, are still below normal levels and need more time to be replenished. Tom Ballestero, director of the University of New Hampshire’s Stormwater Center, said last year that bedrock wells on residential properties were likely deep enough to last through the drought than shallower wells. Last week, he said that may no longer be the case as bedrock wells monitored by the U.S. Geological Survey have been showing levels lower than normal. He said that may also be happening with other bedrock wells, which can be 300 feet deep and recharge slowly because of their depth. Municipal and…

Wildfires fueled by gusting winds, hot, dry weather, and desiccated plant life have burned nearly 900,000 acres of Oklahoma so far this year, a record, as well as parts of Kansas and Texas. The blazes have destroyed dozens of buildings and killed seven people as well as hundreds of cattle. A chimney is all that stands in the footprint of a home destroyed by wildfires near Laverne, Okla., on March 12, 2017. Credit: REUTERS/Lucas Jackson Late winter and early spring are typically the peak wildfire season for the region, as dry, windy weather arrives before the spring green-up of crops and other plants. But this season has been particularly active because of drought conditions that have creeped up during the winter, driven by record warm temperatures and a lack of precipitation. Climate change is expected to impact many of the factors, such as precipitation, that can contribute to wildfires. But exactly how it might affect future wildfire risks in the central and southern Plains is an open question, and one that has seen relatively little attention to date. ‘A Lot of Bad Luck’ While this time of year is typically the main wildfire season for Oklahoma and surrounding areas, this season has seen a record-breaking amount of land scorched by 133 large wildfires ignited in the Panhandle and eastern Oklahoma, with conditions exacerbated by a perfect storm of ideal fire weather and a deepening drought. (Large wildfires are those covering 100 acres or more.) That drought has developed due to a combination of exceptionally warm fall and winter temperatures and a lack of precipitation. While total precipitation to date is actually close to average in the Panhandle, with a little more than 5 inches since Sept. 2 in the town of Buffalo, about 3 inches of that precipitation came during a single January ice storm, with almost nothing falling since. Temperatures, meanwhile, have been unusually warm. October through February was the warmest on record for Oklahoma; on Feb. 11, temperatures in Magnum, in the southwest of the state, hit 99°F (37°C), tying the highest winter temperature ever recorded in the state. The burn scar of the Starbuck fire around Ashland, Kan., which spread from Oklahoma to Kansas in early March. Credit: NASA/USGS Those continually warm temperatures increase evaporation during the winter season and exacerbate the drought. “That’s when we saw the large leap in drought conditions, when normally we wouldn’t see that,” state climatologist Gary McManus said. While warmer winter temperatures would normally lead to an early spring green-up, the lack of precipitation has stymied that development, leaving plenty of dead and dormant vegetation to fuel wildfires, McManus said. Winter wheat has also taken a hit…

Not every cloud has a silver lining. Despite all the snow and rain that fell from the sky during the March 14 nor’easter and steady improvements in reservoir storage levels during the past few months, 14 counties in New Jersey remain under a drought warning and four others are under a drought watch. And don’t expect those warnings and watches to be lifted anytime soon, according to state environmental officials. Although some aspects of the drought situation have gotten better in recent weeks, other key indicators are not faring so well. Among the troubling factors, according to Larry Hajna, a spokesman for the state Department of Environmental Protection: New Jersey did not get as much snow and rain as it needed during the winter season. As a result, most regions of the state are currently rated as moderately dry, and the northern coastal region — Monmouth County and northern Ocean County — is classified as severely dry. Stream flows in the state’s northeastern and southern coastal regions have been extremely dry during the past 90 days. Shallow groundwater is rated as extremely dry in the state’s southwestern region, the area along the…

A very active winter season that featured relentless storms brought significant drought improvement to California.
According to a March 14 Drought Monitor report, only 8.24 percent of California is currently labeled in a drought.
Back at the start of winter, 70.11 percent of California was labeled in a drought.
It is quite impressive that a drought that started about five years ago was greatly reduced in only a few months.
Drought conditions two years ago in March 2015.
While the excessive rain and snow did have some negative impacts at times, the overall impact was positive as the rain lead to significant improvement in the drought.
As you can see in the image below, one positive impact was water level improvement in many of the major reservoirs across the state.
Looking back two years from today, it was a much different story with all of the major reservoirs below their historical average.
It also hasn’t been just rainfall that has been plentiful.
The snow total for the season currently stands at 519.5 inches.

Groundwater is by far our largest of the four water reservoir systems in California, where agriculture and urban users consume about 40 million acre-feet (MAF) each year, mostly from spring to fall: Mountain snowpack, in an average winter and spring, holds about 15 MAF Surface water storage reservoirs have a total capacity of 40 MAF Soils store many 10s of MAF of our winter precipitation for use by natural vegetation, crops, and urban landscaping Groundwater reservoirs are endowed with well over 1,000 MAF of freshwater With this endowment, groundwater storage works like a large bank account.
Water levels rise during winter and spring due to recharge from precipitation and recharge from streams that carry winter runoff (plenty of bank deposits), while groundwater pumping is limited (small account withdrawals).
In dry years, it is common to see water levels recover less during the (dry) winter.
In wet years, the opposite occurs: water levels recover more strongly after a wet winter and groundwater levels are not drawn down as much in the summer, resulting in a net year-over-year rise in water levels.
In other places, the decline in groundwater levels may be less obvious: year-over-year water levels fall during drought, but recover during wet years.
The decline has also created groundwater storage space to replenish with extra water in wet years.
Recharge as the driver for groundwater recovery after drought.
Figure 3 shows some good examples from the Sacramento Valley (Yolo County) and the southern Central Valley (Tulare County): If neither of these resources are at hand, consider the rate at which water levels have fallen over the past five years: recovery may likely happen at about the same rate as water levels have fallen.
Irrigating suitable agricultural land with surplus winter water may allow recharge of one-half to two feet of water between December and March – allowing for additional intentional recharge in wet years of perhaps 2-6 MAF across the Central Valley, if and where water rights, infrastructure, and agricultural chemicals could also be managed appropriately (Water Foundation, 2015).
Groundwater: Where does our water come from?

Among the assistance services are programs for livestock operations whose grazing has been affected by disasters and an aid program covering losses not covered by federal insurance.
The program, based on the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration drought rating, evaluated each farmer based on the number, type and size of cows and the grazing area, farmer Mike Dee said.
Smith, who runs the XTRA Ranch, a cattle operation on 2,500 acres with his wife Erin, and other cattle farmers who typically rely on hay and rye grass to feed their livestock over the winter began feeding their herds hay earlier than usual as the drought dried up pastures.
They have to have grass," Dee said.
The issue is compounded because farmers must look for quality hay, which meets the nutritional needs of the herd.
While selling may mitigate the cost of feeding a herd, it potentially still ends with a loss.
Dee, Runge and Smith said calves were not worth as much last fall because there were a lot on the market.
Smith chose to sell market-ready calves and continued as if it were a normal year, he said, even though he operated at a loss.
Row crops Crop insurance provides some security year to year for row crop producers.
In addition to cattle, Dee grows corn and soybeans on about 3,500 acres.

What led to California’s drought-busting rain this winter?.
“It has been a very interesting winter across most of the United States with very stormy and chilly weather in the West,” AccuWeather Long-Range Forecaster Jack Boston said.
La Niña occurs when ocean water temperature are below normal across the central and eastern Pacific Ocean near the equator.
However, there are many other phenomena that occur that can influence the global weather pattern besides La Niña or El Niño.
“The factor that has caused all of the storminess in California this season seems to be an unusual sea surface temperature distribution in the Pacific Ocean,” Boston said.
While El Niño usually favors stormy weather for California, warm water off the coast sent the systems on a more northerly track, missing out on the drought-stricken state.
Water temperatures in this region fell drastically since last winter, allowing storms to track farther south and drop heavy rain and mountain snow over California.
The heavy rain and mountain snow was a double-edged sword for the state, helping to alleviate the severe drought but also triggering flooding, mudslides and avalanches.
Officials also opened the spillway to the Don Pedro water reservoir for the first time in 20 years to prevent water from flowing over the dam’s uncontrolled spillway.
“The rain and snow this winter, especially during January, was a huge help in the short and long-term drought,” AccuWeather Western Weather Expert Ken Clark said.