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Wet March could push out drought conditions

A state climatologist says precipitation during March could determine how successful crops will be this season.

Ohio’s Aaron Wilson tells Brownfield the many parts of the Cornbelt have not fully recovered from fall drought conditions.

“As La Nina wanes this spring, there is a higher probability of above average precipitation heading into the months of March and April,” he shares. “We still need some soil moisture. We still need that precipitation.”

He says La Nina winters are expected to bring highly variable weather, and he’s watching what’s building in the South.  

“Temperatures could be as high as, kind of eclipsing our United States record of 108 in Southern Texas this week for our March record,” he says.

As that warm weather moves north, it will clash with a cold pressure system from the Upper Midwest. Wilson says, “If we don’t have that forecast of a wetter March, the drought risk will elevate even more as we head later into the season because we won’t have that buffer,.”

The National Weather Service says heavy rain/flooding and severe weather is possible for the Ohio and Tennessee Valleys and eastward this weekend.

Widespread high winds could cause fire danger in the southern Plains and localized blizzard conditions in the north-central U.S. into Saturday.

Brownfield interviewed Wilson during the Ohio Conservation Tillage and Technology Conference in Ada.