OttumwaSnomow

Well I managed .56 today from the spoke spinning around the low pressure. Nothing widespread, nothing heavy, nothing severe. But dampness for a half hour. Still extremely disappointed that this sys missed us so horribly. But thankful for something. .66 for October no doubt yet another month of shortfalls.

On monday all outlets said my county had a 70 to 90% chance of rain for Wednesday, wed night, Thursday, Thursday night, Friday, Friday night, Saturday. I have .06 so far. Today was almost wall to wall sun. Some agencies still say 100% for Friday! GIVE ME A BREAK FROM THE NONSENSE.. On monday I looked at setup and thought "unless warm front produces Im just looking at dreaded dryslot".. that is indeed been the case. Im really fed up with 3 things: 1) se iowa continous drought, 2) models are useless 3) forecasting outlets that are absolutely zero value, both govt and private ones, as they seem not to care at all about accuracy in this generally rural area. Nothing is "normal or Average" anymore in this place!!!

Rinse and repeat. A bunch of hype. A couple strips and stripes of decent precip. Large area of nada. Models stink. WHEN WILL PEOPLE START ASKING WHY HALF CONTINENTAL NORTH AMERICAN IN CONSTANT DROUGHT!!! Ottumwa Iowa airport has 15" rain in 2023!!!!

Once again Ottumwa airport leads state in yearly deficits. However ive recorded about 22" more than the airport.

Ottumwa will more than likely be dry slotted. If I get any heavy rain it will be with the warm front. Wrap around will be light. We desperately need 3 plus inches of rain. Probably wont happen.

I give up.. I recorded .03 this am. Of over 333 locations across Iowa again in the lowest 50 sites. Since aug 13 I have 1.66 inches. Again of 333 locations im in lower 40 to 50 locations. Its darn chronic here!!!! Is this Southeast Iowa which nearly year round is the wettest part of Iowa based on closer to gulf of Mexico??? Throw out all climatology add up the numbers. Stupid hell hole here. Iowa has microclimates and I 100% know they exist. Ive been studying them for 17 years. 80% of rain events in growing season all my friends is Oskaloosa albia ames madrid and many other iowa towns get more rain than Ottumwa. Just a fact. A 17 yr fact. We are disbanding our mowing division. Have averaged about 14 mowing a year since the summer of 2012 thats unreal!!! It should be 24 to 29 mowing. We avg 13 pushes per commercial snow site since 2014. Will stick to that and other contracting. Im so done with Ottumwa Iowa weather!!!!!

It will be interesting to see how the climate compares between there and chi.. I've kept a eye on ozarks and noticed that high temps and especially dewpoints are lower than se iowa in summer! I tell folks i can think of many summer locations across the south more attractive than se iowa and they think im nuts. Like nc, ga, ark.

I feel your pain fellas. This is unprecedented here. 2012 dried up in june and it rained good in mid sept. In 2017 here rain totally cut off mid may until mid sept when we had a 8 inch rain in one night! BUT 2023?? ALMOST NO RAIN APRIL 20 THRU MAY!!!! OTHER THAN A DECENT POPUP OR TWO JUNE 19 THRU JULY AND A FEW WET DAYS TO START AUG.. ITS A RELENTLESS DROUGHT!! in past 49 days i have 1.6" basically one decent rain since aug 12th! Only rained over 1" twice in 2023 and once was feb! My pond soon will be dry and fish are dying.. 200 to 300$ water bils monthly. Thankfully we have lake red rock!!! Otherwise Ottumwa would die of thirst. And now 5 days over 90! 96 for hours downtown today!

It wont be a new pattern if the trough drops east of Iowa as it has done over and over and over. Will there ever be a trough east side of rockies to Mississippi river that last more than 1 or 2 days!!! Seems rinse and repeat to me. Trough east.

This is getting ridiculous. Another total bust by models 1 to 5 days out. Rain chances for 5 days. I got .03 in 3 minutes this evening. Thats all 5 days of rain chances. Driest may I ever saw. Steady deficits since March and now this. Is this Iowa? No its a hell hole. Years of deficits. Nothing is normal. Wetter winters than growing seasons. Oh but no darn lack of humidity 80 dewpoints!! Never seen a humid air mass push out with zero precip like this place. Why no lift! Why? Strips and stripes of poultry rains. Last aug i had a 15 inch deficit for 2022. What is it now? Another 15 inch deficit! Just horrible. Im starting whole different business. Done with this desert. KDMX - Super-Res Reflectivity Tilt 1, 6_09 PM.mp4

How is .5 and with 1.40 inches in 42 days any relief here? Almost every rain in 2023 have been spotty. Isu did a study that iowas largest rain statewide was in feb!!!! Feb is typically one of driest month. These patterns all stink and cant be sugar coated. Strips and stripes of moderate rains, big deal. My area living in D3 severe drought. Same most of growing seasons since 2012.

I seriously hope these next several days produce some long awaited heavy rain! I had .15 yesterday while many spots around had 1 to 3 inches. Its been rinse and repeat all yr! Why are heavy rain events so spotty! Its only rained over 1 inch 2 times in 2023 mby! 1.52 for sept now. Month after month after month of deficits!!! Summer after summer as well. With a couple exceptions for 11 yrs. My pond is almost dried up. Some people can't get a new pond ful for 3 plus years here!! Whens last legit flood warning? June 2021 very isolated. Could ride a bike across the Desmoines river here now. But hey theres water. Most creeks long dried up most of the yr!

I ended up with .95 here. Which is way more than was expected for several days leading to the system. We planted 60 fall wildlife plots for hunters that were progressing well early Aug and most died since! But were able to plant rye and oats in many when the models became more bullish, another big gamble that appears to pay off. Not one single above avg precip month since Feb.

In the past 30 days Ive had 3 different sprinkles for a grand total of .20".. that come after a May with .89. I did eek out 7 inches of rain between june 19th thru Aug 11 which was much more than other in our area got in mid summer. I wouldn't rate the 2023 drought as bad as 2012 or 2017 both just horrible here. But 2013 and 2022 seem not on par with this one (not over). Oh but trust me there were several other summers particularly july aug sept when Wapello county was deep into pretty colors on the drought monitor. But given the constant deficits damp soil simply nonexistent at any level currently. Horrible.

That was a good pattern for omaha kc much of mo and even far se of iowa like Burlington keokuk fort Madison. This coming pattern could be similar? But I got 1 wet week of that nw flow ring of fire all summer. My area is literally getting barely 2 to 4 above avg rainfall weeks per yr. Recently

Troughs east of Mississippi river almost never bring above avg rain here. Need a trough eastern rockies. I dont see it

47 here this am. Felt great! Actually could of used another blanket! Unfortunately 16 straight days of basically zero rain. After the rain deficits since mid April and the 100s last week this is becoming a dire situation in my area. But I have had 20 inches of precip in 2023.. I hear Cedar Rapids has only had 14"? Possibly 2nd driest year in history.. I used to blame Iowa drought on the extreme dry on west coast. Throw that out the window. Iowa is the new south dakota. Crazy deficits for over a decade now. With a few wet periods. Of course I will NEVER FORGET THE NATIONAL GEOGRAPHIC IDIOT who said in a report that climate change is causing Iowa to float after the mo and miss river floods and that could lead to world starvation!!! THAT GUY COULDN'T HAVE BEEN MORE WRONG! Most of Iowa in constant drought since I saw that. With modern crop genetics crops still decent.

Same here, higher temp thanks to lower dewpoints. But my first time over 100f im several years.

My high dewpoint today was 83.5 at 3:15 pm. My son had 85 west of Ottumwa. We usually get these low to mid 80 dewpoint 2 or 3 days every summer. Incidentally there in barely any large corn fields within 1.5 miles from our homes. Big woods mostly.

Today I began as a official coop observer in the Ottumwa Iowa area. The OTM site is about 7 miles north of the downtown part of Ottumwa city. My location is just off the ene edge of the city. But its a breezy spot mixed with trees and fields and some homes. Basically no extreme radiational cooled valley location nor a urban heat island like Ottumwa city near the Desmoines river. I look forward to providing accurate data. Since i was 10 yrs old this has been a goal of mine. A neighbor in Unionville, Md set the world record 1 minute rainfall! That family were very dedicated as coop observers. Im having trouble uploading the pics?

Memorable day here! 1.25" fell today. Far out did the models I saw. More showers than can count and 2 periods of heavy rain. Here the crazy truth. My wettest day in 2023!! Things have turned around with regular light rains since about june 18th. But finally some runoff into ponds and creeks (a little). 2.60 in past 10 days as well. Still waiting for some repeated or heavy rain to charge the creeks!

Well this sys literally dumped inches west south and east of me!!! And tues nites dumped torrential rains west and south of me. In 2023 Ive recorded just one rain over 1 inch, in march!!! Ridiculous. Pond keeps dropping and creeks bone dry for months. But Ive gotten alot of crumbs. In past week 1 inch has rained on 5 occasions. So things are growing good.

What a storm! Had it all. Heavy rain, wind and dime size hail! I call them cabooses. West to east sagging front and cells keep former further west and I get one of last cells! .62 in 20 minutes! Get that horrible air from past 3 days out of here!! 20230728_231418.mp4 KDMX - Super-Res Reflectivity Tilt 1, 11_06 PM.mp4

Its been a crazy 90 days in the counties surrounding me. We mow and work on farms in 6 counties. And at times its literally a huge difference just 3 to 5 miles away! For example lake Rathbun one end has been lush green and the other end dust and cracks galore! I think the folks at the drought monitor can simply not reflect what im seeing on the ground all around se iowa! These chin high soybeans just 1.5 miles from my land. But solidly in the D3.

Pretty much tells the story here today. Although it fell to 68 this am. 97.3 temp, 81 dewpoint and I even saw for a moment 120 "feels like"!!!! Was brutal.