Texas Ain't Gettin Any

just a little thread to keep up with the drought sitiation

COLLEGE STATION, April 7, 2011 – The drought situation in Texas has reached the critical stage, says a Texas A&M University atmospheric scientist who also serves as climatologist for Texas, and the U.S. Drought Monitor has designated parts of central and eastern Texas as under “exceptional drought” in its latest assessment.tamunews.tamu.edu...

www.drought.unl.edu...

The ferocious Texas drought is clobbering crops, thinning out cattle herds, decimating wildlife, and drying up streams and reservoirs, but it's also wreaking havoc deep underground, where the state's aquifers are dropping at a precipitous rate, experts say.Read more: www.star-telegram.com...

The word drought doesn’t really capture what’s happening in Texas. The last nine months have been the driest in state history. Instead of rain, spring brought nearly half a million acres of wildfires. And in central Texas, around Austin one of the area’s largest lakes is drying up.
thinkprogress.org...

The structure in the middle of the image below was once covered with water at Lake Travis but has now become exposed. German settlers built this homestead when the southern Colorado River was much narrower.

LUBBOCK, Texas -- With much of the nation focused on a spring marked by historic floods and deadly tornadoes, Texas and parts of several surrounding states are suffering through a drought nearly as punishing as some of the world's driest deserts.www.huffingtonpost.com...

Among the states, Texas is ranked #1 for total livestock and livestock product receipts. It's ranked #2 for total agricultural receipts, behind California.

In terms of revenue generated, Texas's top five agricultural products are beef cattle and calves, cotton, broilers (young chickens), greenhouse and nursery products, and diary products.
www.netstate.com...

Approximately 40% of America's oil comes from domestic oil fields in states like Texas, Alaska, and California.

July 20, 2011
BEE CAVE, TX -- The Pedernales River is drying up more and more every day, and green brush can be seen sprouting up all over the vast majority of the river bed.

In 2009, the Pedernales River was as low as it is now, but that wasn’t until August of that year. The drought in 2009 took a toll on the number of fish in the Pedernales River. Two years later, a similar situation is raising more concerns about how long it will take the fish numbers to bounce back. Our park ranger believes it could take another two to three years without drought for the fish numbers in the Pedernales to bounce back to where they once were.www.kvue.com...

A small hurricane might be the right medicine.

Until then we better start a rain dance.

A friend of mine runs a dairy farm here in Iowa and he said that cattle ranchers are literaly giving there livestock away right now in Texas. Because of the severe heat and drought no one has anything to feed there cattle and the dead loss is unimaginable.
Apperantly they are having to buy sialage and hay from out of state, which most farmers can't afford to do right now.

reply to post by jam321


that's exactly the rumored wish goin around
I think what disturbs me more is the potential larger impact especially considering other areas and if things continue to worsen

Yea this is serious stuff with ramifications we have not seen yet too. I found an article describing this not as a drought which can be temporary, but an 'aridification' taking place!

Climatologists call drought a “creeping disaster” because its effects are not felt at once. Others compare drought to a python, which slowly and inexorably squeezes its prey to death.

The great aridification of 2011 began last fall; now temperatures in many states have spiked to more than 100 degrees for days at a stretch. A high pressure system has stalled over the middle of the country, blocking cool air from the north. Texas and New Mexico are drier than in any year on record.

www.nytimes.com...

The wildlife are suffering too and animals are killing/abandoning their young because instinctually they know survival chances are slim.
www.abovetopsecret.com...

Another factor here is the burden of power grids/transformers due to over use of AC.
Then of course there is agriculture and livestock. This is bad me thinks...

spec

reply to post by highfreq


thats crazy but understandable

reply to post by Rustami

The arid conditions in the Southwest are bad enough to cry about. Texas, Oklahoma, Kansas and Nebraska have the Ollagah aquifer under them. So much water has been pulled from it that its level is dropping and is not being replenished.

Rivers are drying up from evaloration and use from irrigation. The springs that feed the lakes and rivers of west Texas are disappearing

Texas is begging to buy water from Oklahoma to take care of its population in Dallas/Fort Worth.

Drought is a huge problem that needs a remedy. Send the cloud seeders back to us. They've done enough up north.

Because we're tired of hearing how big it is.

Maybe that deluded superstitious fairy-tale believin' conservative hard-right-wingnut governor of theirs, Rick Perry, will ask Texans to pray again for rain there. What a nutter. Talking to yourselves will NOT bring rain Einstein.

Perhaps Perry should try actually doing something besides clasping his hands together and talking to mythical characters.

a friend of ours was recently approached about buying a horse because the owner couldn't feed it and couldn't keep it where it had been. Our friend told him he couldn't afford to buy the horse. They've already sold all the cattle they can because of the feed situation. The gentleman offered to trade the horse for his stash of aluminum cans. Our friend has a new horse.

The best price they can find for hay is $100 for a round bale. And yes, a lot of people are having to go out of state. They are also bailing the corn stalks that have died from the drought and using that for feed.

We are in SE Texas. I've lived here since 81 and it has never been this bad. Wells are going dry. Have my fingers crossed that mine doesn't. No grass left because I'm certainly not going to water it from the well. We've mowed the grass once since winter.

Power lines are starting grass fires because the dust buildup causes static electricity. First time I've ever seen that in my entire life.

It is a very bad situation and not looking to get any better.

reply to post by Rustami


Another twist of irony is that cause of death, in a lot of cases, isn't necissarily dehydration. They are finding that the cattle are actualy dying of over drinking.

LUBBOCK, Texas (AP) — The unrelenting Texas drought has produced a cruelly ironic twist: cattle dying from too much water. Agriculture officials in parched Texas said Wednesday there are no hard numbers on how many head of cattle have died but reports of deaths from too much water or too little are showing up across the nation’s leading cattle production state.They over drink because they’re thirsty,” said Dr. Robert Sprowls of the Texas Veterinary Medical Diagnostic Laboratory in Amarillo. “Once they fill up on water it happens pretty quickly.” Producers are losing cattle after moving them from withered pastures where water tanks have dried up. Once in new pastures, cattle that die take in too much water too quickly. The animals die within minutes and their carcasses are found near the stock tanks from which they were drinking, Ted McCollum, a beef cattle specialist with Texas AgriLife Extension Service in Amarillo, said

Link

reply to post by pplrnuts


Oh you wouldn't believe how many of us are: praying for rain, lighting candles, doing rain dance.

Texas is a free market-minded state. I'm sure the economy will fix this drought. The invisible hand of the market will save us all!

Originally posted by 2012srb
Because we're tired of hearing how big it is.

5 million barrels of oil and 1 million gallons of Corexit wouldn't have any affect on the gulfstream and it's associated whether patters would it?

Cause oil being the cause of hardship on the states that directly benefit from it would conclusively prove that karma embraces irony.

I'm sure it's unrelated though.

reply to post by TXTriker

We've mowed the grass once since winter.

yeah me to and to think I nearly started a lawn service for some extra dinero
dust on the wires~fire wow

reply to post by Minihaha


I thought DFW got it or is it also from Cedar Creek Lake?

reply to post by schrodingers dog


Was just thinking that myself, could be a possibility as there were claims (although wild at the time) that the spill could affect the Gulf stream which in turn would screw with the climate

It would be the ultimate irony however if it was the case.

Originally posted by pplrnuts
Maybe that deluded superstitious fairy-tale believin' conservative hard-right-wingnut governor of theirs, Rick Perry, will ask Texans to pray again for rain there. What a nutter. Talking to yourselves will NOT bring rain Einstein.

Perhaps Perry should try actually doing something besides clasping his hands together and talking to mythical characters.

don't what to tell you except Jesus was raised from the dead, you may find this interesting-

The vine is dried up, and the fig tree languisheth; the pomegranate tree, the palm tree also, and the apple tree, even all the trees of the field, are withered: because joy is withered away from the sons of men.
Joel1

We all think the possibility of man made weather could be true right. The PIC (people in charge) could be doing this to disrupt the TX separatism movement. What better way to stop a movement then to starve the main players of money and food to supply a separation from the union.