82 Percent Of South Dakota Is Affected By The Drought And It’s Truly Heartbreaking

This summer has been a hot, dry one for South Dakota. In addition to just suffering with miserably high temperatures, the famers are suffering from devastating drought conditions. According to the U.S. Drought Monitor, 82.10% of South Dakota is experiencing at least moderate drought conditions. Read on for more information.

There's currently a widespread drought across the northern plains of the United States.

It's affecting several states, including South Dakota, Montana, North Dakota.

The hardest hit areas of South Dakota are located in the central and northwest portions of the state.

And the drought has gotten considerably worse in just the last week. The U.S. Drought Monitor reports conditions once per week. On July 11th, moderate drought conditions affected 72.41 percent of the state; 41.58 percent was experiencing severe drought; 10.74 percent was experiencing extreme drought.

On July 18th, those numbers had all gone up by about 10 percent - 82.10 percent of South Dakota was experiencing moderate drought; 54.64 percent severe drought and 11.12 percent severe drought.

It's estimated that famers in the northern plains region of the country will lose as much as 64 million bushels of wheat production, and other crops are certain to be negatively affected as well.

Many South Dakota farmers and ranchers are eligible for disaster aid due to drought conditions.

One of South Dakota's most pressing concerns is feed for the 3.85 million head of cattle in our state.

The USDA recently opened up 450,000 acres of Conservation Reserve Program (CRP) acres for emergency hay production and grazing, which will hopefully alleviate some of the stress on cattle ranchers.

In addition to the suffering of farmers and ranchers, pheasant hunters are likely to be affected by the drought this fall.

The South Dakota Game, Fish and Parks Department has expressed concern over the dwindling pheasant population, especially in the Mobridge area.

How has the drought been affecting you? We love to see your feedback and comments!

The weather in South Dakota has been pretty crazy this summer. How about that hail storm we had in late June?