Drought Conditions Plague Texas Crops

Jul. 24–Adam Estrada and many other citrus farmers in the Rio Grande Valley are breathing a sigh of relief after Hurricane Emily dropped much-needed rain on their crops.

“It helped a lot,” said Estrada, who grows oranges and grapefruit in La Feria. “The land was really dry before, and we had to use manual irrigation.”

The rains definitely provided some moisture for the Valley’s parched land, officials said, but in most areas it wasn’t quite enough to overcome drought conditions that have plagued the region for months.

Several factors determine drought conditions, including water availability, average rainfall and soil moisture, said Carlos Rubinstein, regional director for the Texas Commission on Environmental Quality and Rio Grande Watermaster.

Based on some of those factors, the Valley was considered to be in extreme drought before the hurricane, according to a monitor created by the U.S. Department of Agriculture, the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration and the Drought Mitigation Center. So while the rainfall the Valley received from Emily helped, it wasn’t sufficient to pull the Valley out of that drought, said Andy Patrick, meteorologist in charge at the National Weather Service in Brownsville.

Hurricane Emily’s rainfall also wasn’t enough to make an impact on the reservoirs that supply water to the Valley, Rubinstein said.

“Most of the rain fell below Falcon (Dam), and most was on the Mexico side of the Rio Grande,” Rubinstein said. “There was no way for us to capture that water.”

Still, some rain is better than none.

“We’re at about 50 percent of normal rainfall,” he said. “Before (Emily), we were only at 20 percent.”

According to National Weather Service figures, Brownsville had received less than 4 inches of rain before Hurricane Emily. Emily’s rains brought the total up to 6 inches, but that’s still only half of the normal rainfall expected by July. After Emily, Harlingen’s rainfall total was 7.5 inches — normal rainfall is almost 14.

McAllen fared better — Hurricane Emily actually helped bring the area up to normal rainfall totals, Patrick said.

Luckily, much of the water stored in the Falcon and Amistad reservoirs belongs to the U.S., providing ample water for cities and for irrigation this year, Rubinstein said. The U.S. total capacity — the amount the U.S. has available in the reservoirs — was at 93 percent as of July 16.

However, having water in storage won’t alleviate the drought — only more rain can do that, officials said.

“We do have some decent chances of rain coming up, so we might start making a dent in the drought,” Patrick said.

Estrada, at least, is grateful that he won’t have to water his land as often for awhile.

“It will probably be a month before I have to water again,” he said.

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