Severe Drought Conditions

We need rain.

The trees are dying. We have lost more trees in this drought than we did with Hurricane Ike. Pines that are 100 years old are brown. And they are dying everywhere.

Wildfires are raging. Thousand of homes have been lost. Last week ash was falling into my yard. It is bad.

An article from August summed up our current condition. I couldn't find one more current, although I know conditions are only worse:

"As part of an excellent update on the city’s drought, the National Weather Service dug up an incredible statistic: Since Feb. 1 Houston has recorded just 5.81 inches of rain. The next driest comparable period – that is, the 191 days from Feb. 1 through August 10 – occurred in 1917 when there were 10.98 inches of rain.



Here’s another way of looking at it: The city has now gone 198 days without a 1-inch rain event. The last day Houston recorded 1 inch of rain came on Jan. 24. This has broken the record of 192 days set during the fall and winter of 1917-1918.

In other words, this dry spell is simply off the charts and it’s going to have myriad consequences for the area, from our trees and wild creatures to home foundations, not to mention the agricultural effects on a larger scale.


Just as it has locally, the statewide drought continues to worsen to historic depths.


The latest report from the U.S. Drought Monitor was released Thursday and it continues to be brutal for Texas. Now nearly 95 percent of Texas is in at least an extreme drought, with nearly 80 percent in an exceptional drought."

We need rain.

Houston's average rainfall is about 48 inches. Seattle's rainfall is only 36 inches. Portland usually gets about 40 inches a year. We should be getting more than everyone, yet we are getting less than the Mojave Desert. This year we have only received about 6 inches of rain.

This is no grass for the animals to eat. Craig's list is giving away horses if you can feed them (I heard the last time horses were given away for free was during the great depression.). Friends are having to ship hay in for their animals from states as far away as Utah or Tennessee.

The ponds are but a puddle. Snakes are coming out from their hiding looking for water.

And the water bugs. They don't infest homes like roaches. But they look like roaches. Some may come into your home looking for water, about like a cricket would. But they are big. The only time I have ever seen them in my home is when we have been without rain for a while. This morning I picked up some dirty laundry off the bathroom floor and one of these water bugs must have been hiding in the clothes. It tried to escape by running up my hand and up my arm. I screamed. I can still feel it's fast moving legs on my arm.

We need some rain. Pray for rain.