Extreme drought in Minnesota

The national news this past week featured stories about how the drought in the western states is imperiling vital water supplies needed for agriculture and the generation of electricity.  Somewhat more quietly, a drought has also been affecting the Upper Midwest, here in Wisconsin and according to this StarTribune article even moreso in Minnesota:

Entire channels of the Mississippi River are caked dry. Rocks, riverbeds and islands of the St. Croix and Minnesota rivers are visible for the first time in decades. Dozens of streams are at their lowest recorded levels since at least 1988, or even the Dust Bowl.

On Wednesday, the Minnesota Department of Natural Resources (DNR) put much of the state in a "restricted phase" as the drought continues to get worse. That means water utilities and suppliers will need to cut down the total amount of water used to no more than 25% above what they used in January.

Parts of Minnesota have even slipped into the most severe level — "exceptional drought" — for the first time since the U.S. Drought Monitor began ranking droughts by four levels of intensity. The ranking system wasn't around during the Dust Bowl, but meteorologists believe that and the drought of 1988 might be the only time Minnesota has been this dry...

Mallards and gulls are taking over newly formed islands in some of the state's largest rivers. Great blue herons are stalking desperate fish corralled into smaller and smaller pools for some of the easiest meals the birds will likely find in the wild...

Wolves could fare well if the drought starts stressing or weakening deer to the point where they become more vulnerable. One thing that is almost certain is that bear hunters will probably be very successful this fall, Stark said.

As berries, acorns and hazelnuts becomes less available, bears become more bold in going after bait piles set by hunters...

About 60% of the state's streams and rivers are flowing at or near record lows, according to the U.S. Geological Survey. The flow of the Vermillion River near Voyageurs National Park was down to a trickle Wednesday, crawling at just 10 cubic feet per second — the lowest level recorded since measurements began in the 1990s, said Eric Wakeman, supervisory hydrologic technician for the Geological Survey.

"Usually it's flowing at about 310 cubic feet per second," he said. "What we're seeing now in some of these areas, especially central Minnesota and in the northeast, are fairly unprecedented."

It's also hot up there.  I spoke today to an old friend who has lived in the Walker area for 25 years; he has never seen a summer this hot and dry.  In an average year air temperatures at Leech Lake reach 90 degrees about one day per summer;  so far this year the temp has reached 90 or above twenty times.