GOLDEN VALLEY, Minn. — For the second year in a row, many areas across the state are dealing with abnormally dry conditions or under a severe drought, which weather experts say, these conditions aren't as abnormal as they may seem.
Down a half-foot of rain on the year, Saturday's showers were a welcomed sight for many across the metro still trying to recover from last year's drought.
"Last year's drought covered the whole state, this drought is confined from basically St. Cloud on south, and the Twin Cities is right in the worst of it. You've kind of got a patchwork of haves and have-nots in the state," said assistant state climatologist Peter Boulay.
This, now leading to lower water levels in area lakes, and drier gardens and fields for crops.
"It's the trees that need it," said Boulay. "So the mature trees are in good shape. They can tap that moisture — something maybe you planted in the last year or two — the roots are pretty shallow. Still, that's the ones I'd worry about the most."
"We need to average about an inch of rain per week just to be normal, and we haven't seen that at all this year," explained KARE 11 Meteorologist Ben Dery.
A sense of normalcy, at a time when weather patterns, experts say, are anything but.
"What we've found is that over the last 20 years, our weather's been very variable, highly variable from wet to dry," Boulay said. "So whether that's a pattern that's going to continue or are we going to have something more normal if that happens, I guess its hard to tell."
MORE NEWS: WEATHER: Storms tonight, showers tomorrow
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