Browse Climate Stories - Page 13

Georgia experienced a much warmer than usual December. Temperatures were three to six degrees above normal across the state. Rainfall totals ranged from over eight inches in the northern regions of the state to less than an inch along the coast.

The current drought in Georgia has caused significant problems for farmers in central Georgia and other areas of the state, but a lack of impact on the state’s larger cities and drinking water supplies has kept it off most Georgians’ radar.

Agriculture uses about 70 percent of the world’s fresh water supply, but a growing population’s increasing demand for drinking water means farmers need to learn how to do more with less water.

While the beginning of December has felt more like spring, Georgia experienced colder and much drier than normal conditions during November.

Temperatures in Georgia were within one degree of normal across the state in October. Rainfall continued to be light across most of the state, continuing a trend from a dry September. A narrow band stretching from Columbus to the northeast mountains was the only area of the state that received higher than normal rainfall.

Daniel Hillel, the 2012 World Food Prize Laureate and a 1950 graduate of the University of Georgia, spent the better part of his career perfecting arid- land farming methods in Israel and sharing them with farmers across the Middle East, Africa and parts of Asia. On Nov. 8, Hillel will return to Athens to deliver the College of Agricultural and Environmental Sciences’ 2012 D.W. Brooks Lecture at the Georgia Center for Continuing Education.

Georgia made it through September without much dramatic weather. Temperatures across the state were normal, but rainfall was light. The areas that received the most rainfall were affected by the remains of Hurricane Isaac in the first week of September.

Forecasters initially projected that rains from Hurricane Isaac could erase or at least put a large dent in Georgia’s drought, but the state has seen little relief.

Farmers can’t control when drought, a late freeze or violent crop-wrenching storms will affect their fields, but they can be prepared when those disasters come knocking.

In spite of record-setting high temperatures at the end of the month, June was slightly cooler than normal in Georgia. Rainfall across the state varied greatly as Tropical Storm Debby dumped more than 10 inches on the southern half, but left north Georgia dry.