Severe U.S. Drought Continues
By Quincy Vagell on August 3, 2012, 11:25am
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The drought across the country has become one of the worst on record.
Roughly two-thirds, 63% of the United States is experiencing some sort of drought.
The story gets much worse across portions of the Midwest and Mississippi Valley as extreme to exceptional drought conditions are reported over a relatively large area of land.
Following a dry and mild winter, the excessive heat this summer has caused already dry ground conditions to become that much drier. Combine this heat with continued below average rainfall and the drought is not in a hurry to go away anytime soon.
Reports have come in about massive fish deaths as low water levels combined with very warm water temperatures make the water literally inhabitable for many fish.
It's not only affecting fish though. Crops are being severely impacted.
The USDA's National Agricultural Statistics Service has said that about half of the nation's corn crop is rated at poor to very poor. If that wasn't bad enough, more than one-third of the soybean crops are in the same category. With about three-quarters of the U.S. cattle acreage located in drought-affected areas, the impact has been major for countless farms.
As of August 1st, 1,584 counties in 32 states were listed as Natural Disaster areas.
Not much relief is expected as a relatively dry and hot pattern is expected to continue for the Midwest and southern half of the United States as we head into next week.
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