Parched crops. On tablelands above the Trempealeau National Wildlife Refuge on the Mississippi River. Image: Steve Lunde.
Fretting farmers: Where are the rain gods?
WINONA, Minn. – Olmsted County is an epicenter of the continuing Midwest drought with less severe but still alarming conditions in Winona and other neighboring southeast Minnesota counties. Olmsted County, where Rochester is located, shows as red for extreme drought in the current federal drought index. The drought is affecting areas where 4.1 million Minnesotans live, the report said. While dry conditions come and go, the region’s federal drought information coordinator, Molly Woloszyn, warned that recent years have experienced transitions from drought to flood and back to drought, sometimes within months. Woloszyk also cautioned about “flash droughts,” which intensify rapidly.
Color key: Red, extreme drought; orange, severe drought; pink moderate drought.