Drought conditions return

It won’t surprise anyone who stuck their nose out of the air conditioning over the last week that the county is heading back into drought conditions.

The National Integrated Drought Information System reports that more than a quarter of the county is now in a condition of moderate drought – a 23% increase on the previous week.

The drought zones, which account for 27.4% of the county, are located along the northern border and also the southern border and southeast corner.

Streamflows on the Belle Fourche River at the South Dakota border are currently much below average and are expected to stay below average for the next month both at that monitoring location and the one near Moorcroft.

For the rest of July and into the beginning of August, the National Weather Service Climate Prediction Center expects temperatures across the nation to be above average. In northeast Wyoming, there’s a 70 to 80% chance of above normal temperatures.

At the same time, there’s a 50 to 55% chance of below average precipitation.

This follows a 60-day period in which the recorded precipitation has been below average county-wide. The northeast corner has been hardest hit with between 25 and 50% of normal precipitation, with most of the rest of the county receiving only 50 to 75%.