Droughts steady since 1950s

Daily Telegraph (UK) ^ | 11-14-2012 | Nic, Collins

[Renfield]

According to a commonly used model of drought patterns, researchers had previously assumed that higher global temperatures were causing greater evaporation of water, and therefore more droughts.

But a more detailed analysis of weather data, including wind speed, humidity and radiation levels, found that in fact there has been "little change" in drought over the past 60 years.

Researchers from Princeton University and the Australian National University said drought was "expected to increase in frequency and severity" in the future, but added that currently used prediction methods are inaccurate.....

[mylife]

droughts come and go.
It has been severe in Texas for the past few years.
The midwest got whacked hard this year.

They had them in Biblical times way before industrialization

[doublecansiter]

Did I misunderstand my science classes in junior high?
I thought you had to have evaporation of ground water
to get rain. Something called “The Water Cycle”?

MIke

[muawiyah]

just look up Drought Monitor and you can see how things have been over the last year, etc.

We are currently in one of the great north american droughts.

This is not a Dust Bowl stage drought though but it could be if we also had drought in the North East and South Forida as well as the Northern Great Plains, Southern Great Plains, Central Great Plains, Ohio Valley, SE, SW, California and PAC NW

That would be evidence of continuing patterns of dry winds sufficient to reduce ground water to ziperooni

I"d suggest everyone keep their eyes on thisnext year. Today we had snow of some kind show up in 34 different states ~ and that's from COLD DRY AIR ~ widespread ~ and yet little moisture moving in from the ocean. This is drought weather.

Watch those 10 day weather forecasts. Intellicast has them localized.

[muawiyah]

Water evaporates from the world ocean, lakes, rivers, isolated seas, and, lo and behold, the ground!

Rain forms when warm moist air moves in from one place to another and encounters colder air.

Today's snowfall ~ widely spaced around thenation ~ trivial amounts really ~ hit 34 different states over the last 2 hours. That's a sign of little moisture in large air masses ~ just local stuff, evaporated mostly from lakes, rivers and the ground ~ in the presence of cold air.

Drought continues.

[mylife]

I am ready for the cycle to break here in Texas but don’t expect it anytime soon.
We had no hurricane season this year.

[mylife]

We had no hurricane season this year.

It must be those darn oil wells in the gulf!

[Mercat]

I just want my farm pond to fill back up. It was a jewel and now its a mud puddle.

[mylife]

I hear ya.
We’d be in trouble without them.

[henkster]

The long term weather cycle we are currently in most resembles the conditions of the mid-1930’s. This too shall pass, probably within the next year or two. If I recall, the 1940’s were marked by moderate summers and severe winters (just ask the Germans).

[Ruy Dias de Bivar]

Every one around here used the drought as an opportunity to clean out and deepen their dried up ponds. Since the last few rains, some of them have refilled.

[SunkenCiv]

Thanks Renfield.

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[SunkenCiv]

GGG managers are SunkenCiv, StayAt HomeMother & Ernest_at_the_Beach	join list or digest view topics view or post blog bookmark post a topic subscribe
Thanks Renfield. To all -- please ping me to other topics which are appropriate for the GGG list.

[Ernest_at_the_Beach]

Just posted this:

Global cooling? David Archibald says temperatures are about to dive

[Mercat]

We’ve done some of that too. But it hasn’t refilled. We have a small watershed so it may take a few years to come back. This is Douglas Co. KS

[txhurl]

I’m curious why NWS called for an El Nino this fall and winter... it did not manifest so they’ve corrected it to ENSO.

[muawiyah]

Not an expert in El Nino but my understanding is predictions are not always accurate, but you'll know it when you see it.

That Sandy storm is instructive. If something like that happens about 3 weeks later it's possible it could move on up to Baffin Island and start building new glaciers. That's where the glaciers start that eventually come down and crush Chicago!

[muawiyah]

Not an expert in El Nino but my understanding is predictions are not always accurate, but you'll know it when you see it.

That Sandy storm is instructive. If something like that happens about 3 weeks later it's possible it could move on up to Baffin Island and start building new glaciers. That's where the glaciers start that eventually come down and crush Chicago!

[muawiyah]

Of historic, and relevant current history ~ in Texas. The Spanish tried numerous times to settle along the Texas coastal zone. They brought in every sort of livestock, made fences as appropriate, surveyed vast tracts of land and carved it up (1,000 arpents was pretty standard for a subdivision in those days), and, in general approached that vacant landscape pretty much the way Americans would do it ~ not any different really.

And hurricanes came regularly and blew down their buildings and barns, destroyed their grist mills (absolutely necessary for European types of civilization), knocked down the fences, let loose the cattle, turned loose the hogs, allowed the chickens and guinea hens to fly hither and yon, and it was just one thing after the other.

Currently historians get real excited in Texas every time somebody funds a foundation for a house or other building that can be dated BEFORE 1760.

Now while all that was going on the Comanche Indians managed to tame the horse, developed advance riding techniques, delved into trade and, lo and behold, began wearing Spanish style clothing, and turned to firearms as the thing to do!

Before that the Comanche lived up there in Montana ~ but as soon as they got the first horses they began relocating.

Someday somebody has to do a serious DNA study on these guys ~ they've got a lot more Spanish ancestry than they ever let on. And they certainly had serious cultural contact with Spaniards or people like them long before they moved to Texas.

I suspect there was a Great American Drought going on in the Central and Western Plains that lasted up to 80 years before 1760 ~ so that'd take it back to 1680 ~ and by then the Spaniards had actually figured out the entire Western coastline all the way to Little Diomede ~ and the 54 degree 40 minute entrance from the Pacific to the inside passage. Yet, they simply could not make any settlements stick in the PACNW to Texas in all that period - with the exception of the complex in New Mexico

That's a more serious drought than the one we currently have underway, but it ain't over!

[Ruy Dias de Bivar]

I believe Chaco Canyon in New Mexico was abandoned after a 25 year drought, back in the 12th or 13th century.