Statewide Soil Moisture Report- 24 August 2015

This week’s report could really be a story about the “haves” and “have nots”. First for the “haves”: Copious amounts of rain fell across much of east central and northeast Nebraska over the past week and across pockets of south central Nebraska. In these areas, the SMI is generally above 3.0 with a healthy surplus of moisture, especially for late August. However, these locations were generally the wettest in the state last week and some of them (i.e., Mead and Firth) have still not had an SMI less than 0.0 this season. With decent chances of rain toward the end of the week, it is likely that these locations will remain favorably moist.

Now for the “have nots”: It would be a stretch to say that any area of the state is truly in drought at the moment. But there are some places that have missed out on recent rains and thus, much of the panhandle and central Nebraska are experiencing seasonally dry conditions. Unfortunately, the best chances for precipitation are in east central and northeast Nebraska where moisture is most plentiful.