photo by: Nick Krug

In this file photo from July 2014, a group of Lawrence kids beat the heat while playing in the fountain at South Park.

Lawrence is experiencing “extreme drought” as a result of the city receiving just half the normal amount of rainfall through the first seven months of 2018, according to the National Climate Data Center.

As of Tuesday, the official National Weather Service station at Lawrence Municipal Airport had recorded 12.04 inches of rain in 2018, said Bryan Baerg, meteorologist with the Topeka NWS office. That is about half of the 23.25 inches of rainfall Lawrence receives on average through the first seven months of the year. By this time last year, the station at the Lawrence airport had recorded 22.31 inches of moisture.

Baerg said much of Douglas County may be even drier than the airport station’s figures indicate. Of the 2.52 inches the station recorded in July, 2 inches were from a single storm that didn’t produce any rainfall in south Lawrence or much of Douglas County, he said.

That has been the case with many cool fronts that have pushed through northeast Kansas in recent months, Baerg said. They have produced localized showers but not widespread precipitation.

A cool front that moved through Douglas County over the weekend lowered daytime highs to the comfortable mid-80s but produced only scattered localized showers, Baerg said, and no rain is forecast for the next seven days. Afternoon highs will be back in the 90s later this week, Baerg said.

The National Climate Data Center includes Lawrence in an area of “extreme drought” that extends from Johnson County to central Kansas. Extreme drought is the second-most severe of the National Climate Data Center’s five drought classifications — the least severe being “abnormally dry” and the most severe being “exceptional drought.”

Moreover, the National Climate Data Center predicts that drought conditions will persist in northeast Kansas through the end of October.

The dry weather is taking a toll on farms and gardens in Douglas County.

Steve Wilson, owner of Baldwin Feed Co., said dry conditions have already set up a miserable fall corn harvest at his Baldwin City grain elevator. The prospects for the soybean crop diminish with each passing day without rainfall, he said.

“It’s like it has been August since May,” he said. “Naturally, bushels per acre are going to be down … It’s hard to say with soybeans. They can put on pods two or three times a season, so they have more chances. It’s been overall stressful.”

With the drought conditions, homeowners and gardeners need to conduct a landscape triage when deciding what to water, said Tom Buller, a horticultural agent at Douglas County K-State Research and Extension. His advice is to focus on watering expensive, hard-to-replace plants like trees and large shrubs, and to not worry as much about watering lawns and annuals.

“Lawns might not look green and pretty, but K-State research has shown a lot of grasses will just go dormant and survive on a quarter the amount of water they normally get,” he said.

Buller said that those who think drought years will become more common as a result of climate change should consider planting more native plants, which tend to be more drought-resistant than imported plants.

Watering lawns contributed to the city of Lawrence producing about 100 million gallons more of treated water in July than what’s normal for the month, said Mike Lawless, deputy director of utilities. The city water department produced 565 million gallons of treated water in July. Over the past 19 years, the average amount of treated water produced in July has been 465 million gallons.

The city’s biggest water use days are typically Mondays, Wednesdays and Fridays, when automatic lawn sprinkler systems are programed to run in the morning, Lawless said. The city’s single biggest water production day was Wednesday, July 13, when 21.1 million gallons of water were produced.

Surprisingly, the water level at Clinton Lake is near normal despite the drought, said Samantha Jones, Army Corps of Engineers natural resource director for Clinton Lake.

“We’re at 874.32 feet Tuesday,” she said. “Our normal multi-use level is 875.5 feet, so we’re just a little bit low. Honestly, that’s not bad for this time of year.”

The Corps is releasing water from the lake at 21 cubic feet per second, the minimum amount needed to keep the Wakarusa River healthy, Jones said.

“At this time, we don’t have any concerns about the drought in regards to Clinton Lake levels,” she said. “We’re pretty surprised we’re maintaining the current lake levels.”