Pond Boss Forums GENERAL QUESTIONS Pond Boss Drought in small area

I have received 0.4 total inches of rain, no more than 0.1 at a time since July 26. Some places within 12 miles in two directions have received over five inches. Bad luck?

Sounds like a good year to dig a pond. We are way over average rainfall. I wish you luck getting the rainfall that you want.

Man John, thats awful. I have thought about you as I was watching the radar for the past month. Really thought a few times that you would be getting some really good rain. Hate that you are in such a spot. Hopefully the fall rains will hurry your way!! How is your BOW doing?

Down 25 inches as of this morning. I am hoping for two inches of rain in about 10 minutes time.

I'm hoping for you also! I'm down further than that...but this was the first year ours has gotten to full pool. Dropped alot over about of month of no rain back in July/Aug. We are still down a few feet...but MUCH better than before. I lose 1/2" a day though during dry hot weather...so its expected when you go through a bad dry spell. Wish I would've found PB before we started the pond!

John is this a pattern for your particular area long term? Or is it just this particular year. I never got to see your place but from what I understand we rode pretty close to it when riding down the Pig Trail. The mountains were all pretty green and beautiful.

Are the mountains what causing the rain to drop out before it gets to you? Kind of like the area east of the Rocky Mountains is very dry because all the moisture precipitates out as it passes over the mountains?

Just wondering if you situation is a permanent one or just a weird year for your area.

It's a weird year. The tallest hills nearby are only about 800 feet higher than here, so that would not make much rain shadow effect. A farmer I know about 12 miles SE of here has received over five inches total in the same time period, in four separate rains nicely spaced out. Some areas to the west about 15 miles have received about three inches. North about 8 miles, three inches. Build a pond, cause a desert to develop.

John, I've gone through years of that. I could see rain close but it seldom came to my place. I even mentioned it to Lusk. He lives about 60 miles away but had noticed it.

And then we got 2 years of floods.

I have always heard droughts are preferable to floods, but not to the fish.

We had absolutely no rain for the first 11 days in August, and very little rain in July. My pond went from full pool the end of May to around 50 vertical inches low on August 11th. I was mowing grass growing in bluegill bed depressions.....

We received about 3/4" rain on the 13th, then on the 15th, from 11 am until 5 pm we had roughly another inch. From 5 pm until 11 pm we received 7 5/8" or rain, and from 11 pm until 6 am on the 16th, we received another 3/4" or so. In a span of 12 hours we had 8 3/4" of rain, and a total of 9 5/8" of rain in about 18 hours. My pond was going out the overflow on the morning of the August 17th.

Since then the pond has bounced up and down a few inches, but we seem to keep getting rain in 1/2" to 1" increments, and those rains come all at once.

The mosquitos have returned like it is the first warm week in the Spring too.

Some people near here had more rain than I did, and many people had flood waters where it never flooded before. I still am finding things that got wet and have to be thrown out.

We did get a little rain this last week(3") and it was most since end of May, but too many cracks in the ground for any runoff.

I finally got 1/2 inch yesterday, did little good for pond. They are getting heavy rain again today about 15-20 miles north of here, where it's not needed.

John. I have been in my new house almost exactly 2 years. the pond was complete a few months before the house. I haven't had enough rain here for anything during the warm months. I sodded my lawn and planted seed on fence lines and around the pond. My grass has really suffered. My pond was down 20 inches 3 weeks ago. i have been pumping water from a nearby stream and almost have it back full. I am in the process of doing something about an electric pump for the pond. I have been using a gas pump rigged to a 5 gallon bucket of fuel. My place is exactly like your, everyone around me gets plenty of rain.i have seen it rain like crazy less than a mile from my house several times in the last month and I not get a drop. My friend lives about 10 minutes from me and we have joked about him having a micro climate for 15 years. he always gets rain and people 3 blocks away won't get a drop. I think i have a micro climate, but opposite of his.

My creek has not had enough water to be worthwhile to pump it for over four weeks. No flow at all, just a few small pot holes full of ozark minnows and gambusia. I estimate it has over 500 acres of watershed, at least.

Wow, I'm glad I'm not in this alone! This is the lowest my pond has been since it was filled 2 years ago. I also can pump from a stream below but it's way to dry. Meanwhile just 30 minutes north of here they keep getting rain almost daily. Im the curse of death!

The 10 day forecast for my area hot with no chance of rain.

Same problem here. We have a rain deficit of over 8 inches for this year, and are now labeled as in severe drought. It will rain like a SOB within view, but not a drop here.
One thing I have observed over the years is wet areas promote more rain, dry areas trend dry. The microclimate is influenced by existing conditions.
Luckily our pond still has plenty of water even though it is down 24 inches, and our well is still running. The mower is not, and the vegetable garden has up and died. I refuse to use our well to irrigate and take the chance of running it dry. One of the scariest thoughts is a wife unable to take a shower.

Me too Squid. I time my Wifes showers by the calendar; not the clock.

We got missed again today. Some places about 30 miles north of here had flash flooding with up to five inches of rain. Still only 0.9 inches of rain here in the last 44 days. One farming weather and drought monitoring site says we need over seven inches to break the drought.

And we are getting hammered again with flash flood warnings.

We received just over an inch of rainfall before daylight this morning. It more than doubled our rainfall totals since July 26. It helped a little, but the creek is still dry except a few small pot holes, and it only raised the pond about 1-1/8 inches. Some areas near here have had five inches or more this past week. More rain is forecast for late next week, but that has been the case for many weeks, and when we get close to the forecast date the rain is taken out of the forecast.

We got 2.5 Thursday night and 1.7 Friday night.

We are not strangers to having a muddy harvest but it is unusual to have it muddy in September for corn harvest. We don't usually have a muddy harvest till the latter half of bean harvest in November.

This year may turn out to be an exception. About 25% done with corn and should be about 75% at this date. Some years finished by now.

I always go to Husker Harvest Days (big farm machinery show) in Nebraska and most years we are done or close to done with corn harvest and often take a van load of the crew with me. Not this year. Show starts Tuesday and I will be going by myself.

snrub, I just returned from a fishing trip to Tenn, Miss. Alabama and traveled through Ark and La. Most every corn field was standing but looked like harvest time. Guessing all of the fields were wet for harvest. The Soy beans fields looked really green like at my small fields of beans. Seems to me, its been the wettest yr this year. Send me a pm if u need someone to harvest one of those old bucks that are into your bean and corn fields. Just kidding with u, seems like I just set in the deer stands to watch them any more, looking for that special one. Maybe all the rain will drive up corn prices if not able to harvest do to wet fields. I know little about big farming other than I used to know family that did some serious wheat farming.
John F, I hope u and others needing rain get what u need as I know a low pond pretty much sucks !!

Tracy

Tracy I've got plenty of guys hunting bucks. It's the does that are the problem. They keep crapping out babies.

I remember when I was a kid seeing a deer was almost unheard of. Now we have herds. Wild turkeys were not around here until they were introduced (some on my families land) in the mid 70's. Now we have groups of 30-40 pretty common.

For the hunters of the area, we are blessed with wildlife.

Ouch! Unless I'm reading the regs wrong, a non-resident has to apply early in a drawing, the tag is $442.50 if your name is pulled from the hat, then each doe tag is another $52.50. I didn't see where a non-resident could just buy an antlerless tag. Am I missing something?

I'm not a hunter but I think that sounds right. My buddy from Seattle wanted to hunt deer here and I think that is what he ran into. Big dollars to get into the lottery with no guarantee of even getting a tag. I could get landowner easy but he could not use the tag. Wanted to bring his grandson with him for a deer but they ended up bringing shotguns and going after Geese instead because the tag and license was easy for that. (and a week before they came there were loads of snow geese on the old pond)

I have several employees and grandson that hunt the properties, but I have not hunted anything since a teenager so I do not keep up with it. Too busy when I was making a living and too many other fun activities now. It just never floated my boat that much. I prefer motor cycle riding (summer) and scuba diving (winter in a warmer climate). Those are my passions............along with the ponds now.