Will it ever rain?

The trees all around us look so dry. The grass is brown. Leaves are starting to fall, its hot and there isn't a cloud - anywhere - in the state.

The trees are suffering. I'm starting to worry. When you live in the woods with dry, suffering trees all around you... you worry. Not just about tree survival. You worry about fire.

We're having the worst drought in decades after having the wettest winter in, well, decades. It's hotter than Hades most days, and we lost our fruit crop to a late, long freeze. Our winter wheat as well.

It hasn't been a good year for weather here in Indiana, especially the southern half of the state.

From the Bloomington Herald Times:

About 40 percent of the state is in a “D2” stage of severe drought, National Weather Service meteorologist Logan Johnson said. That determination is made by the weather service along with other agencies such as the U.S. Department of Agriculture and fire and weather agencies, he said. They’re looking at things such as the amount of rain, the status of deep groundwater wells and soil moisture for the weekly rating.

Why isn’t it raining? Persistent upper level high pressure systems are keeping away the cold fronts that are necessary for rain. That makes precipitation spotty, Johnson said. For example, they’ve had reports of rain in the northern half of a county but none in the southern.

“The ridge is just so strong it keeps that weather pattern,” he said. “And Indiana drought years typically come with this same weather pattern.”

Time to do the rain dance again. In earnest.