Monday, July 1, 2019

MikJournal Monday 07/01/2019...Mid-Year Stats

Welcome to the mid-year edition of my Journal. Doesn't it seem like the first half of this year just picked up where last year left off? Wet. Quite likely, another new 12-month precipitation record, this time from July 2018 through June 2019, will be set for Kentucky, possibly replacing last month's all-time 12-month record.

London recorded 12.22" for the month of June, obliterating its previous wettest June on record.

London also recorded its wettest month on record for any month of the year, beating out the previous record of 12.16" set in December 1990.

Jackson 3rd wettest June

Covington/Cincinnati 4th wettest June

Louisville 6th wettest June

Bowling Green 9th wettest June

Lexington and Frankfort fell just outside of their top ten wettest June's on record.

After last evening's rainfall, my June total surpassed the 10" mark, coming in at 10.08". My annual total now stands at 35.61", well ahead of last year's mark at this time.

Oh, and by the way, you will be pleased to know that little sliver of west or south-central Kentucky that was in an "abnormally dry" shading was officially removed during the latest drought monitor report.

Surprisingly, most areas finished near to slightly below normal in the temperature department. This past week of drier and hotter weather really helped out.

I'm seeing signs of an overall national and global shift in temperatures. For the past few years, we have been experiencing much warmer than normal readings, top 5 rankings at least. Hopefully, the cooler pattern we are seeing now will continue and help temper the extreme weather events many locations have experienced over the last several years.

I talked to a farmer from Indiana yesterday, and he said his watermelon crop is a near-total loss. Some fields of central and southern Indiana still have water overlaying the land, prohibiting some from even planting their crops. He informed me that some farmers say this is the worst they've seen it in several decades.

I guess in some ways, too much water is worse than a drought.

Well, the end of the snow season occurred yesterday. You can check out the blog statistics and compare your location with several NWS sites. Some of my favorite tracking locations near the Tug Hill region of western New York saw much less snow this past year compared to previous years. I'm still working on finalizing that data.

Your geography bee of the week has to deal with another "Tug" in its name, the Tug Fork of the Big Sandy river. For years, I always thought the feud of the infamous Hatfield's and McCoy's were separated by a fence. Well, in this case, it's the liquid fence of the Tug Fork, separating Kentucky and West Virginia.

It's been a fascinating, albeit confusing read, these Hatfield's and McCoy's. There were so many of them. And despite the many bloody events, several Hatfield and McCoy members were married to each other, which made it even more difficult to keep track who was supporting what side, if any.

Anyway, it's a piece of Kentucky history. Go to Pikeville sometime or the eastern part of Pike county, where the McCoy's occupied much land. See the other side, where the Hatfield's lived, just across the river in West Virginia.

Image result for hatfields and mccoys tug river map

From a slide on a page of history.com

Meanwhile, have a good week. Have a safe one too.

MS

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