HELENA – The Governor’s Drought and Water Supply Advisory Committee had its first meeting of the year on Wednesday, April 17.
Officials in attendance said that despite an unusual winter, so far drought conditions do not appear to be an issue this spring.
In January, the year’s snowpack levels across the state were concerning for potential drought conditions, but then in February, the state saw record snow locked up by bitter cold. Because of that, experts said the state is in a good place right now.
Officials did warn about potential drought issues in the upper northwest corner of the state as well as northeastern Montana.
Just like all weather in Montana, those outlooks can change.
“If we do get a really dry spring and we start to see a rapid melt in that snowpack that could cause most of the state to possibly go into drought conditions,” explained Megan Syner, warning coordination meteorologist with the National Weather Service. “So there’s still a lot of variability as we get into the spring months but we’ll be closely monitoring that and we’ll be providing updates as well.”
The Montana Departments of Agriculture and Livestock are also closely monitoring the weekly outlooks this spring and recommend farmers and ranchers do the same.
“We’ve got a lot of water left to move so there could be a lot of flooding impacts, a very wet landscape to work with, which could affect movement management of animals,” said Mike Honeycutt, Montana Department of Livestock Executive Officer.
Snow melt in Montana isn’t the only runoff ranchers should be paying attention to this year. Devastating flooding in the Midwest this winter may also have a big impact on Montana beef.
“I think another thing to watch is hopefully our partners in the Midwest, which is where we market a lot of our cattle and hope that the concerns that they have with flooding this winter don’t have any potential to disrupt our movement of to the Midwest later in the year,” added Honeycutt.
The Montana Department of Agriculture is also actively working on improving the Montana Mesonet with the University of Montana.
The ultimate goal is to have a near real time monitoring network for soil moisture, precipitation, and direction and speed, climate monitoring, water table and temperature most places in the state.
“We’re looking at tracking how close are we to wilting point in the soil so we will have an idea of how stressed the crops are in different areas and how are we walking that line with drought,” said Brett Heitshusen, Environmental Science Specialist.
The Montana DNRC offers online tools to monitor drought conditions and the impact on crops and livestock. You can visit their website for more information.
-Reported by John Riley/MTN News
