Amy, They aren't too bad yet, but I feel for the farmers/ranchers losing their bales of hay, pastures that could have been winter forage, barns, tractors, trucks, trailers, etc. Even one fire is devastating to the person whose place burns up. The odd thing about recent fires is how quickly they've spread. Our grassy fields look deceptively green but apparently are drier than they seem. Normally that's not an issue until after the first freeze when everything dries out and goes dormant pretty quickly, and we haven't even been close to having a freeze yet. There was a grass fire over the weekend that was pretty far from our place. Eventually I think that 10 of our county's 14 VFDs were out there fighting it, including our, and they were out there for several hours. I was shocked when the fire was first paged out because I could walk out into the yard and stand in the driveway beside my garden and see the smoke, which surely was a good 12-15 miles from us. Both the rate at which it spread and the speed with which it spread (not to mention the huge smoke plume) was shocking. It was sort of a wake-up call that winter fire season is coming. After our guys and trucks were out at that fire, which was well to our east, another fire was paged out in the Thackerville area. That one seemed to take quite a while and a lot of water as well. The next day there was a barn fire out west. I guess it is already that time of the year, though it sure doesn't seem like it should be. We've been fairly busy with medical calls and motor vehicle accidents, but there haven't been that many grass fires or wildland fires. I hope we're not about to have an early start to the fire season. We're hoping the weekend was just an odd blip and not a sign that activity is picking up already. No good comes of a fire season that starts in October. It is bad enough when it starts in November. When the "Fire Danger" graphic reappears on the NWS-Norman webpage, I do start paying more attention to the fire weather. This graphic is beginning to pop up sporadically the last couple of weeks. It was there this morning. I think we are going to have a very warm Halloween weekend, so I hope the kids and their parents didn't plan any Halloween costumes that are too heavy or too hot. I'm glad you got rain even if it means you have to respray the greens with Bt again. I am all for whatever works to bring rain. When I walked down to the mailbox, I could see the big clouds that are very far away---probably near Ada or possibly even further north. It looks like they are having some stormy weather. Stockergal, Y'all really have been rain deficit pretty much all year, and that's unusual. Look how long it has been since Lisa has had to pour 5 or 6" out of her rain gauge before it starts overflowing? She used to have to do that pretty often, but not one single time this year that I can remember. Honestly, if we have to have drought, let's have it in winter, and hope the rain comes back for spring and summer. In some prior years I did handle winter/early spring drought incorrectly by sort of ignoring it. I put off watering the garden, thinking that surely it would rain any day now and I just waited and waited and waited for rain (which failed to materialize), and the plants struggled because they were too dry too early in the season. I'm smarter now and I'll irrigate in February and beyond after planting, but if I am going to do that, then the spring and or summer rains had better return at some point so that the early irrigation wasn't a wasted effort. Nothing is more frustrating that watering for 2 or 3 months while you wait for drought to break and rain to return, and then you gradually realize the drought isn't going to break and the rain isn't returning any time soon. Oddly (you know, October is sort of our second April), some of the parts of OK that are receiving or could receive rain today might get some severe weather, including hail. Can we not just have some badly-needed rain fall merely as rain without there being some severe weather included with it? Sometimes I think back to some lovely, long-lived gentle rain showers from the early 2000s where we sat out on the porch or the covered patio for hours and watched nice, gentle rain showers, followed by rainbows and excited frogs venturing out to play in the puddles, and I wonder why that so rarely happens any more. Rain showers seem to come fewer and farther between in recent years, and then we get either 0.10" or we get 6-12" in one day and flooding instead of getting a nice, gentle inch or two or three. Dawn

Well, crap, I messed up the dates. Lol. Haven't done that on any checks I've written yet this year. It is too late to edit since I posted it over an hour ago, so we're stuck with it. Amy, I don't like the look of it either. I was hoping the new outlook would perhaps forecast more improvement, especially for central, northeastern and eastern OK, which were so dry last year. Let's not give up hope. Maybe the monthly outlook issued in a couple of weeks will show improvement forecasted for February or maybe the next seasonal outlook, issued a month from now, will show some forecasted improvement. And, of course, sometimes the outlooks and forecasts are wrong, though the drought outlooks seem correct more often than the rainfall forecasts. A dry spring wouldn't be horrible, except for the fire season part of it. At least when the temperatures are cool to moderate, you could tell that watering makes a difference. However, a dry summer on top of the already-existing drought conditions could make this a really tough year for farmers, ranchers and gardeners. If drought were to persist for a second summer, you might not be able to water enough to keep plants happy.

I found the Drought Monitor map for the northeast since not everyone on this forum is from Massachusetts.: U.S. Drought Monitor Map - Northeast

Landscape Message: Jun 22, 2018 UMass Extension's Landscape Message is an educational newsletter intended to inform and guide Massachusetts Green Industry professionals in the management of our collective landscape. Detailed reports from scouts and Extension specialists on growing conditions, pest activity, and cultural practices for the management of woody ornamentals, trees, and turf are regular features. The following issue has been updated to provide timely management information and the latest regional news and environmental data. The Landscape Message will be updated weekly in June. The next message will be posted on June 29. To receive immediate notification when the next Landscape Message update is posted, be sure to join our e-mail list. '''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''' Drought conditions update: As of June 21, Massachusetts is experiencing level D0 - 'Abnormally Dry' - in all areas of the following counties: Berkshire, Franklin, Hampshire, Hampden, Worchestershire, Middlesex and Essex. The western half of Norfolk County is also rated D0. Use this link to view the map: http://droughtmonitor.unl.edu/CurrentMap/StateDroughtMonitor.aspx?MA '''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''' And for the Northeast US Drought Monitor - Northeast