Another 100% chance of rain down here today.

Is the drought over then?

Been dry here for a month but cool.

No drought here. We are +2.5 inches of precip over normal for the year with another inch due today.

tj

We have had 3 thunderstorms in the past week, and it is raining right now. No drought.

The rather severe (multiple year) Northeastern drought of 2015- 2016 (New England, to most of NJ, to eastern Pa) has definitely ended. There were a couple of heathy Winter snows and now regular Spring deluges ever few days. Now under multiple flood watches. I would rather see standing water in my rear yard as I do now than having to fear Spring brush fires any day!

Looks like the entire South & East is experiencing showers & thunderstorms at this time. Is the drought over?

We've had a few rains in Northern VA, but could use much more. Many have not even been measurable.

That's the trouble with looking at weather radar, it always looks better than what you hear from the people living there. I see this even closer to home.

We certainly aren't in drought here. We had 5 inches of rain the other day.

There were two years of drought from New England down to Long Island, much of NJ (especially central and northern), and eastern Pa.. That has ended for now and soil moisture is probably above normal by now and reservoirs are good for the Summer. Surprised to hear that N. Virginia is still in some deficit. I believe overall the country is looking better with the exception of Florida.

http://droughtmonitor.unl.edu

May was wet here (over 6"), but the June pattern so far suggests a drier period starting. But growing seasons are typically like that -- alternating wet and dry periods lasting weeks or more.

It rained here yesterday. I haven't been out today to look at my rain gauge.

We had a wet May, but I'm actually watering stuff today (working from home, so I can move the hose around). It's drizzling, but it appears like it's going to amount to nothing, and we're expecting some serious heat in the next week. So I wanted to give everything a good soaking.

It's actually been almost 2 weeks since we had anything more than a quarter of an inch of rain at one time or so. I'm obviously not at all concerned about drought at this point, but I did want to give everything soaking for the heat wave coming, it looks like it's going to be mostly on the dry side for this spell.

I would love to have a wet summer for a change. It's been many many years since that happened. Not water-in-the-basement wet, mind you, but just a nice bit of rain -- like 1 to 2 inches per week! Quite often we have to wait for tropical storms to provide some relief by late summer.

We had wet periods here last summer, interspersed with three weeks of very dry weather.

June had been dry, but a powerful line of Tstorms moving east last evening dumped 2.2" of rain. Haven't driven out to see yet, but might have flattened some of the farmers' emerging corn.

It has stormed here all week. About 2-3 inches each day.

Logan, it depends on where you're at, of course. Weekly (estimated) rainfall from intellicast for this past week -- spotty as you would expect, and it's often not very accurate for amounts (underestimated my spot). WHERE it occurs is pretty accurate:

We have had virtually nothing since June 1, after a fairly wet May.

We've been good, with rains of 3/4" last Sunday, 1-3/4" Tuesday, 1/4" last evening and forecast T-storms this afternoon.

March, April & May were fairly dry, sunny, but not hot, so we came through okay.

Our hot, dry season usually comes in July & August but last summer it was when we received most of out rainfall. Nice but we never expect that to happen and I'm sure the sight of bill_minn dragging the garden hose around the yard will soon be common.

Hairmetal, I am amazed how different your precipitation has been in MD. I am in NJ and this year, June is rather wet. I see hazardous weather conditions for a few days in the coming week due to daily downpours. This Spring, sun has been quite limited; my Seasonal Affective Disorder was better in February than now! I haven't been able to mow the lawn in two weeks. Don't like drought but monsoon not good either. I see there are a few areas getting interesting in the Gulf and deep tropics; so, East may be staying wet a spell (hopefully your yard will get some too.)

It rained again today. I will probably go out and check my rain gauge tomorrow morning.

We're getting our normal summer dryness as usual. Can't call it drought because to me, drought is longer lived than just a few weeks or a month. We picked up a nice slow inch of rain last Friday night but it was almost 3 weeks prior when our last rain of 1/2" arrived. Glad I only have the yard worry about to water but with all the new and raised trees, even that can become time consuming.

I'm seeing even more, that planting locations are important and matching the tree with correct spot matters. I really don't have a wide choice in my sandy loam because it doesn't vary that much. You notice the trees like birch, maple and hemlock get thirsty sooner than say spruce, oak and pine, between rains.

July has been ok. We will end up right around normal (about 4") for the month, more or less, in my backyard.

BWI airport, 10 miles NE of me, is at about 3.3" so far, while Reagan National airport thirty miles south is near 6" this month. For whatever reason, the prevailing path of max potential storm energy is just south of here lately. We got an inch between Saturday PM and Monday morning...which is good.

We haven't had any rain in several weeks now. It's drying out quick, and watering seems to have no effect.

The area south of Milwaukee has been getting a pounding. Every time I see that line of storms I'm thinking send that damn rain up here it doesn't flood here with the glacier tills. Some areas might have received up to 8".

I don't remember the last time in a decade that I've gotten a month that exceeded the typical average precip. during the summer. We're just shy of 3" (1" short of average) for July thus far and I'm totally happy with it.

June was a horrible month as it went hot after a cold freezing May. Also brought dryness and wicked winds. Felt like sustained 20mph wind every other day. My grass ended up with a severe rust fungus because of the dryness in June and severe humidity in July.

Yes, this is a very different year from the last two which saw moderate to severe drought on LI, Ma, Ct., NY, Pa, and NJ. Looks like another East coastal rain even setting up for Friday. I am actually continuing to plant this July due to moist soils and periodic, regular rains.

We finally got some rain this morning. Phew!

This is the very FIRST year my Crape Myrtles had to deal with powdery white mildew. Not the rain so much as the extra tropical humidity of much of July. I am thinking August will be drier..., if only because it's been wetter than normal since last Winter.

My crepe myrtles get it every year. I just cut off the affected growth (usually the suckers at the base).

The forecast models are suggesting anywhere from 1 inch at a minimum, to as much as 6 inches of rain in my area Friday.

Persistently wet summer here (so far) in Allegany Co., MD -- almost 17" since May 1st (3" the last 9 days). Corn planted nearby in late May almost 10' tall. Highest summer temp here so far only 89F (occurred 3 or 4 times), but 85F - 88F common on the "warm" days (ideal for corn) .

Six inches is a lot of rain in one day, are you still there or are you flushed away?

Until this recent rain, we've only had about an inch (cumulative) for July here in my neck of Northern VA. All the storms seemed to go north of us, leaving us so dry. When it's 90 degrees every day, 1/4" of rain here and there just doesn't help much besides raise the humidity.

But with this last stalled rain-maker, we finally got some rain -- 5 1/4" inches! We'll take it!

Since late winter MidTenn has had above average precip, some areas have had WAY above average with flooding. Lots of infrastructure and personal property damage and swift water rescues. A couple weeks ago several people lost their lives in two separate flash flooding incidents. In both instances people were swimming in a river in sunny weather when they were swept away without warning, similar to what sometimes happens in the SW with the monsoon, almost unheard here.

In my immediate area it looks like Ireland, everything is lush and green. This is the exception rather than the rule here, but it happens occasionally. My average precip for July is around 5.50", I'm about 2" above that. Temps at Nashville are around 2 degrees above average so far this month, but that is because overnight temps are warmer due to clouds. I've had fewer 90 plus days than last year, but dew points have been rough, the last 2 weeks have been in the mid 70's. I've heard an ugly rumor that Aug. temps will be below average, BOO HISS!

We've had a return to normal late summer weather here, this week. It has thunderstormed for three consecutive days, today being the first without rain so far. My plants are beginning to recover. This rose of sharon that I planted in June lost almost all of its leaves, now recovering and beginning to flower beautifully.

In my garden, things have reached the "mushrooms sprouting on south facing slopes in full sun" stage! But the Asian plants are clearly loving it, and surprisingly, some non-Asians too. A Cistus X ledon I am cosseting along the walls of my house for protection suddenly threw out some new growth a couple days ago. Which might not actually be a good thing.

David, why did you specify "Asian" plants? Do you specifically mean East Asian?

Many, MANY plants we grow nowadays are actually Asian in origin (Crape Myrtles, Hydrengea, rhododendrons, butterfly bush...)

Is this related to the fact that many of East Asian's climates are strongly monsoonal with a Summer peak in rainfall and Winter aridity.

That's interesting! Never considered that before. (Also, would this imply that other plants in our gardens not of such strongly monsoonal climate, suffer in particularly wet Summers?)

P.S., A lot of my plant collection is centered on Zone6-8 subtropicals of East Asia

We got five inches of rain this weekend. At about 8.5" for the month now.

(Also, would this imply that other plants in our gardens not of such
strongly monsoonal climate, suffer in particularly wet Summers?)

Some of them certainly do, but there is no absolute consistency. For example I had trouble with an Echium from Norcal, that I bought on site at Annie's in 2011. The wet spells of that horrendous summer killed. However I am ever learning. Even the very light potting mix they use out there might be too heavy in our summer humidity and high dewpoints, when I potted it up into, again, a pretty standard mix bought somewhere. You might even get a little bathtub effect going. So, increasingly with anything from a remotely dry climate that is container grown, I am almost considering it de facto bare rooted. I am washing away most of the potting mix and arranging the roots in whatever the new media is. For this year's Echium I am using a very light mix of maybe 40% jumbo perlite, 40% coarse builder's sand, and 20% real promix. Well guess what it is out in the open, in a white not black 3 or so gallon pot. (one of those white proven winners ones) So far so good, actually seemed to enjoy the heavy rain! Which is totally inappropriate for where it's from of course, Macaronesia might have constant mist but never such high dewpoints and never torrential downpours of 1" in a 1/2 hour. (of which we had a couple in the past two weeks) I guess it could still die of root rot, but it's doing much better than in 2011.

BTW absolutely same with the Aloe aristatas I got from HCG. I'm sure even if planted in my plain sandy loam they would be rotting in these conditions. In pure sand, partly sheltered from rain, they looking great and one is even blooming. Will try a couple outside and a couple inside...the outside ones a stretch to be sure.

Of course I intended to keep the Echium as a garage-in-winter plant, until it blooms and dies! I told myself years ago I would never be a gardener that drags a bunch of stuff inside and out...but while I'm already doing it for plants I'm sizing up for permanent outdoor planting, like camellias, might as well have some truly tender things along for the ride. BTW OT (though only barely) but it's fascinating and curious to me how potted camellias seem to suck up a lot more water than potted rhododendrons. Saw a camellia today, potted in shade, and the top of the soil is already dry! That one might be 'Tama' something or rather, which I want to be at least 1/3" caliper before planting out. Oh well a subject for another screed at another time...gotta get ready for bed!

As I said, there's only a limited degree of consistency to these things. This Erodium is done struggling, last week's heavy rains finished it off. It never looked very happy but it had bloomed the prior two springs.

But no great loss, it was very plain. In retrospect I wouldn't have bought it, even if it had lived longer.

UPDATE: and it might have been one of the last dry climate plants I planted by just putting the soil mass directly in the soil. As the organic material rotted away, there could have been a bathtub effect vs. the surrounding sand and pea gravel. For example a nearby Felicia filifolia survived just fine; it was planted as a tiny seedling. So no bathtub effect. (or should we say teacup effect LOL)

Even though it has been less than 2 weeks without rain with temps in the 80's and a few 90's, it is hard to believe how dry my sandy loam soil can get with sunny windy conditions. My one 7 ft. Paper Birch that is recovering nicely from being planted too deep a few years ago, and raised this spring, had leaves turning yellow even though I was giving it water regularly. Apparently, it wasn't enough to keep the soil moist deep enough to prevent this from happening. A long soaking watering stopped the yellow leaves from increasing in number. My 3 ft. Eastern Hemlock had it's first branch turning brown. I thought being it's second year in the ground, I could cut back on the every 3rd day watering when it doesn't rain, guess not. When you read that Tsuga Canadensis will not tolerate drought at all, believe it. My Black Ash in the front yard, had individual leaf clusters in several spots, shriveling up with no change in color, like it was adjusting to lack of water. So, to prevent further crisis, I'm back to every other day soakings of the new trees planted this spring and the trees that were raised this spring, plus every day soakings of any water loving trees like Red maples as they quit putting out new growth until the watering resumed. And this is all on soil that is a real upgrade (Sandy loam) to the Loamy sand where I used to live.

The single biggest factor I attribute this problem too is the lack of shade in my area (due to the lack of any mature trees at all). The mulch makes sure that only the tree gets the water which is a plus but it doesn't prevent the soil from getting sucked dry by the tree in short order.

Finally tonight were are getting a nice soaking rain that is supposed to last all night and most of tomorrow, hopefully giving us a couple of inches to penetrate down past the dry layer. Otherwise an inch will help but it won't totally alleviate the dryness. Either way, irrigation will start again in either a few days or a week at the most, depending on conditions of temps, sun and wind.

My soil drains better than I initially thought. There was absolutely no standing water in my yard (even in the sunken areas) within a few hours of last weekend's rain stopping.

That's pretty good there hair. If we got that much rain in a month, every low dip n the fields would be a pond and water would be flowing everywhere (except the high sandy areas). There's sometimes only several feet between high ground and swamp in my country.

Just checked the rain gauge, there's 2" exactly [happy dance] with light showers forecast the rest of the morning. We needed this as we planted a couple of acres of turnips for wildlife sustenance. It's a small, hard seed and it takes a couple of day wet spell for the germination and sprouting to complete.

They said we where going to get 1-2" from that but it broke north and south. Got a 1/2". Its been doing that all summer every summer for some reasonn There must be something up with the higher elevation where I'm at compared to the north and south of me.

'They said we where going to get 1-2" from that but it broke north and south. Got a 1/2". Its been doing that all summer every summer for some reasonn There must be something up with the higher elevation where I'm at compared to the north and south of me.'

no no whaas, that only happens to me here at my place! lol

Really I can't tell you how many times the rains come and either dissipate before they get here and then redevelops after it passes. Or splits like you say and goes north and south. A lot of times the clouds build and it may sprinkle some but then intensifies after it moves to the east and everybody east of me gets rain. Maybe that's why it's called 'widely scattered'? Dunno... frustrating sometimes.

Glad you got the 1/2". Has it been dry there so far?

Once a drought area develops and becomes entrenched, it becomes difficult to break. Drought feeds on itself in a vicious cycle. It is going to take a major change in weather patterns to break your current drought. The current Drought Monitor shows the most severe drought is located in the Upper Plains and northern Mountain states. Soil moisture is largely above normal in the Northeast & MidAtlantic region but interesting to see drought redeveloping in coastal Maine (there was a two-year drought from this area down to Long Island, NJ and eastern Pa that ended with the previous Winter and Spring rains that persisted into Summer (wet so far). (I also see drought reappearing to the south, in Virginia.) It may be my imagination but seems as though these swings between normal or above normal precip and then drought is occurring with greater frequency than in the past. I think most people are oblivious to this. Gardeners, however, see the difference because we're the one dragging the water hoses or battling the slugs.

http://droughtmonitor.unl.edu

Not bad here considering what areas are getting. Generally I've been short (2.5" per month) of historical growing season averages (3.5" per month) over the last few years so really can't complain.

However when 40 miles south of you has 10"+ inches over the last month and a half compared to your 4" you get a little jealous as they have more clay that doesn't need it compared to my sandy loams that dry out quickly. I've yet to see even minor flooding living in this area over the last six years.

speaking of the last six years I don't think I've ever seen a slug!

U.S. gardeners should take a piece of the US that we believe is the best land for gardening and then push out everybody else to the more caustic environments

I moved up to this area in spring of 1976, snowless winter, followed in May by 3 tenths of an inch of rain, season total, until Sept when an inch or so fell after the first frost and the season was over. The next year, not much better, just enough light rains to not call it a catastrophe. In fact, more years than not we are short on moisture in July and August. All this amplified by sandy soil with sand subsoil. In my time up here it seems like every 5 years we get a good season with enough rain for things to flourish, some of those years just barely enough. This is all just my observations of coarse. And something else I've been noticing the last several years, the Lakes areas, from about New York Mills west, Park Rapids and north, and around Brainerd and east, get more rains more often than my area (we have next to no large bodies of water that stay all summer). I've also noticed that the Eastern part of the state gets more rain than the western part. Again, only observations on my part with no science in the process.

Last year was one where we got rains in July and August, so we just can't expect this year to be all that great. In fact, if we got rains like that every year, the price of land around here would go even higher. Of coarse with so many irrigation systems in place now that it's not a big of an issue anymore.

For the first time in recent memory, MA 6A, feels like a 'normal' climate to me. It is 'normal' hot and humid, and we've had a good rain nearly every week. I cannot adequately express how happy I am not to be out watering every evening, not to keep plants looking 'good' but to keep them barely alive. I have more earthworms than I've ever seen. I'm truly not complaining but we hauled out a wheelbarrow of rampant (normally well behaved) lamium and weeds.

I'd rather pull weeds and shovel overgrown lamium than water, water, water and have a seasonal water bill in the 4 digits and still have soil so dust dry it can't even absorb the water it gets.