Weekend blizzard offers little moisture relief to farmers and ranchers

Cattle huddle together as the South Dakota wind blew on Sunday, Dec. 9. The sun was shining, but blowing snow sometimes reduced visibility. Photo by Heidi Marttila-Losure

South Dakota State Extension sent out this news release Monday:

Brookings—The weekend blizzard, which dropped between 5 and 10 inches of snow on most of eastern South Dakota won’t have much of an impact on drought conditions in farm country says Dennis Todey, State Climatologist.

“The blizzard will do very little for soil moisture because soils were frozen or near freezing prior to the storm,” Todey said.

 Because the snow was fairly liquid, Todey says when it does melt, it may contribute about 1 inch of soil moisture.

 With most of the snow falling in the eastern half of the state, Todey adds that central and western South Dakota farmers who planted winter wheat did not benefit from the storm.

 In addition to visibility issues during the storm, Todey says the storm creates challenges for many cattle producers who will have to pull grazing cattle off corn and soybean fields and move snow out of feedlot pens.

 For personal safety, Todey encourages South Dakotans to watch the National Weather Service Web site, weather.gov or National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration weather radio for winter storm updates and both National Weather Service and Community Collaborative Rain, Hail and Snow network, cocorahs.org, for latest snow totals.

 For more information and climate updates, visit iGrow.org.

The Groton Daily Independent had this snowfall map in its Dec. 11 issue:

Snowfall totals from Dec 8-9 blizzard, from The Groton Daily Independent