maybe that will make the next drought monitor look a little better :) One of the weather forecasters up here was complaining on their blog that this week's rain/snow came too late to be counted :)

lol

Well, we'll get to count it next week.

The "how much rain do we need" map , which I'll link below, is looking a lot better and does not even include this week's rain. I think the last time I linked it, most of us were in the 9-15" categories, and I think part of AR was in the 15"+ category.

Take a look at how much it has improved....

I don't think we ever really get enough rain to make up for a drought year or two. I remember seeing a news story in 2008 or 2009 about how some Carter County ranchers still had ponds or creeks that had been dry since the drought of 2005-06. In those cases, whatever recovery occurred wasn't enough to put water back into the ponds and creeks.

Some of us may plant Saturday in order to get stuff in the ground before the Sun/Mon system hits, and others might decide to wait until after Monday....either way, at least we have a heads up that more moisture is coming,

We need any drop we can get, but does it all have to fall at onion-planting time? Just once I'd like to plant my onions into dry ground instead of mud.

Here is a link that might be useful: {{gwi:367116}}

I think the chart linked is accurate. I live just east or the AR/OK line, we finished 2012 down about a foot. The last local info I remember seeing had us down about 8.5" now. We are gaining ground, but if I got that 8.5 inches now I dont know where I would put it. I doubt that I will be saying that in a few months, so I need to be giving thanks for the rain even though I dont need it now.

Larry

Larry,

Have you noticed that your rain is backwards?

It falls when you don't need it, and doesn't fall when you do need it. It is like a backwards-rain-curse.

We finished 2012 down about a foot as well, and the same thing in 2011. I don't think we'll ever get back that 2' of rain either.

We may find ourselves down a foot of rain at the end of 2013 too, but I like the way 2013 is starting because our rain in Jan and Feb has been above-average. Of course, 2012 was the same way in spring and it didn't get really bad here in our part of the state until summer.

I always feel hopeful in drought years when we get winter rain, but then summer rolls along hot and dry and it ends up being the same old, same old drought. I'd love a wet year like 2007 again, but if we have that kind of rainfall again you, Carol and Dorothy may float away downstream.

Dawn

The previous ice caught Bill off guard. lol By gollies the wood is split and kindling stacked by my son and the indoor rick spills over. And here I am giggly excited to have the moisture. Bring it!

bon

I'm happy, happy, happy for the moisture too, but really bummed about the timing. I have taken a week of vacation to plant onions, potatoes, brocs, lettuce, radishes, carrots and spinach. Even roped my oldest daughter into taking a day off (Tuesday) to come help. Mother Nature must really get a laugh outta me.

Guess we'll just spend the day processing the last of the tomatoes, plum juice and blackberries. If she's willing to come help, I'll make lemonaide out of a snow-storm!!! Hopefully, the next weekend will give me the chance to plant everything...which might be better since I can get the g-kids out here to help too. Yes, I believe in child-labor. haha!

Bon, I hope you get lots of nice, wet snow that will put more moisture into the soil. That dry powdery snow fails to provide much moisture when it melts down. I haven't heard anyone say if this is expected to be heavy wet snow or dry powedery snow, perhaps because in our county we will barely get anything at all, and it is likely to melt as soon as it hits the ground unless our air temps go lower than currently forecast (35 degrees on the night the snow is forecasted to fall here).

Every drop of moisture is good and certainly still needed.

Paula, Is that the worst timing in the world or what? I guess this is not your lucky week.

Oh well, maybe y'all can get everything processed at least and make room to put up more goodies when the harvest of 2013 begins.

Maybe later in the week y'all still will be able to get everything planted. I am planning on being outside, even if it is muddy, planting whatever I can beginning about Wed. For us the rain and snow should end Tuesday night, and maybe the ground won't be dry enough until Thursday or Friday, but I'm still planning for Wednesday and hoping the weather cooperates.

Child labor! That's how I learned to do yard and garden work, and we kids had so much fun doing it that I don't think we even thought of it as work. Well, at least not until we hit those teenage years and decided we had more important things to do.

I don't have anything new in the ground yet, though we still have winter greens and cole crops in the ground from fall, and lettuce and perennial onions in the cattle trough feeder also from fall.. I do have 5 early purchased tomato plants in pots and all of them either have fruit, flowers or both. Last year I put those early tomatoes in a non-movable container on Feb 23rd, but you'll notice I haven't done it this year.

I have a greenhouse full of cool-season stuff I'm very eager to get into the ground, but have been holding off on transplanting them or on planting onions and taters or sowing seed in the ground until after this week's winter storm blows through the state. Down here I feel like the issue isn't like to be snow, but there's a chance of severe weather and with last week's severe weather we had pea-sized hail.....not that pea-sized hail would hurt anything but larger hail could.

I'm more worried about tomorrow's winds here that could gust up to the mid- to low-40s during the day and the night. We need for rain or snow or something to be falling when the wind is blowing that hard, or we could have trouble controlling any fires that start in winds that high.

After last year's early warm-up that allowed us to plant earlier than usual, this year's winter is less enjoyable. I know we don't usually have an early warm-up two years in a row (wouldn't it be nice!), but these recurring snow storms are a trend that Oklahoma gardeners cannot ignore this year. I have a gut feeling that there may be another round of snow sometime after this week. It just seems like the fronts bringing the snow storms keeping rolling across the country week after week.

I'm still going to start planting later this week, but I'll be keeping an eye on the cold nights and the chances of freezing precipitation. I am so ready for spring!

Dawn

What kind of precip is everyone getting? I've had an inch of rain so far...snow just started :)

Lisa

P.S. anyone heard from Jay? Is he getting any moisture up there?

I dont know how much we have received, but it is still coming. We had heavy rain and hail before noon with more predicted.

Larry

All we have had here is very light rain along with lots of clouds and wind. So far we have about a quarter-inch of rain. This storm almost totally missed us.

We had rain yesterday morning and then snow from around 11 am to I have no idea when. It snowed all day long and was still snowing when the sun went down. They were predicting up to 6 inches here, but I don't know what the actual total was. It got a little slick yesterday afternoon, but never that bad and the roads were almost completely clear this morning.

We ended up with a little over an inch, plus whatever the snow adds. It may not add a whole lot. It brings our Feb total to almost three inches though, which is wonderful. Especially considering our average Feb rainfall is a little over half an inch!

Leslie

Leslie, That is an incredible amount of rainfall for y'all to have there in February! Maybe you'll get great rainfall in March too and your garden will get off to a great start.

I looked at the rainfall map for year-to-date 2013 and it is looking really nice. Most of the state has had above-average rainfall, though a few smallish areas have had less than average. I'll link the map I looked at that expressed year-to-date rainfall as a percentage of normal. For anyone who received snow that hasn't melted down into the rain gauge's yet, this map will not reflect all the snow they received until it melts down and they determine what the snow equals in liquid precipitation.

Let's hope the rainier-than-average trend continues for a while so that our gardens and landscapes can benefit from all the moisture.

Dawn

Here is a link that might be useful: