We needed rain. We got rain, and we’re still getting rain. I’m Mike Davis talking with Corey Davis from the state climate office of North Carolina. Corey, over the last several weeks, you’ve been telling us about how drought conditions were continuing to progress in the Carolinas. I think we got the answer we were looking for.
Corey: “Yeah, that’s right, Mike. You know, we had been in that persistent dry pattern going back to the end of last year. Every week we were coming up short on those normal rainfall amounts. We kept talking about. We weren’t out of the woods just yet for seeing bad spring drought conditions in place, but there was still time this month to finally see some good rainfall. And boy, have we ever seen that over the past few days, the first bit of good news in the signs of improvement is on the US Drought Monitor map this week. Keep in mind, this was last updated based on data through Tuesday morning, so the rain that fell during the day on Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday is not captured by the current drought monitor map, but even there, we’ve been able to peel away some of the moderate and severe drought conditions in parts of the far western and far eastern North Carolina. One other promising sign was with some of the groundwater levels, again, in both far western and far eastern North Carolina, we finally seen some of those groundwater wells rise back to their normal levels for the first time since late last fall. So again, that’s something that we have been waiting on, that recovery all winter, and we finally seen it. The other bit of good news is with the rain that we’ve had just over the past few days. Just to put it into perspective, how badly needed that rain was for places like Raleigh, the last time they had at least an inch of rain in a day was back on December the 11th of last year. So we’ve been waiting more than two months for one of those good, solid soaking rain events. We’ve seen totals of up to five inches in parts of far western North and South Carolina, some pretty widespread totals of at least two inches across the Piedmont in North Carolina and the upstate of South Carolina, and even starting to get some of those one inch plus total some parts of the Eastern Carolinas. So again, some very much needed rainfall. Another reason it was needed is when you think about some of those warm days that we had over the last couple weeks that got some of the flowers blooming and the trees budding. Once you start getting those blooms, that means you need a good soaking rain event. And again, that’s exactly what we’ve had this week.”
Mike: And you said it, it’s a nice, long soaking rain.
Corey: “That’s definitely what we’re getting from this event. When you get an inch or two of rain, if not more spread out over two or three days, that does give that moisture a chance to penetrate deeper into the ground. And certainly that is going to be a relief for the farmers out there. We talked last week about how they were at risk of maybe having a delayed planting this year if those dry conditions had kept up, but at this point, based on this rain that’s already fallen and what’s in the forecast, I think they will be in a lot better shape as we head toward the spring.”