According to the U.S. Drought Monitor, December 2013 marked the 19th consecutive month during which drought of at least category D2 Severe intensity plagued at least some portion of this six county North Central Kansas area, prolonging one of the most notable droughts in decades.  Thanks to monthly precipitation checking in well-below normal across the entire local area, the U.S. Drought Monitor noted a slight December degradation in drought classification. The primary change was that Category D1 Moderate Drought returned to some areas that had been designated as no-worse-than Category D0 Abnormally Dry for the past 3-4 months. As a result, drought classification at month���s end featured a continuation of Category D2 Severe Drought within far western Rooks County, along with roughly the northwest half of Phillips County. Meanwhile, D1 Moderate Drought not only covered the remainder of Phillips and Rooks counties as before, but now also included all of Smith and Osborne counties, along with western portions of Jewell and Mitchell counties. Eastern portions of Jewell and Mitchell continued to hold onto Category D0 Abnormally Dry (considered to be one category better than true drought).
Even though most of this six-county area totaled between 2-7��� of snow during December, essentially all locations suffered a notably dry month as most snowfall contained minimal liquid equivalent. Based on reports from around 20 NWS Cooperative Observers, and also radar-derived estimation, at least 80 percent of the area totaled less than one-third of normal December precipitation (based on long-term December normals generally around 0.75). Per NWS cooperative observers, a few of the lowest December precipitation totals featured 0.02 near Covert in rural Osborne County, 0.03 at Cawker City and 0.06 two miles southwest of Alton. Although still well below normal, a few of the highest monthly amounts included 0.33 at both Jewell and Mankato and 0.31 at Burr Oak. According to the USDA Kansas Crop Progress and Condition Report at the end of December, state-averaged topsoil moisture supplies rated 29% short to very short and 68% adequate. Subsoil moisture supplies were slightly worse-off, rating 39% short to very short and only 59% adequate.
Looking back over the year 2013, although drought conditions were not as severe within this portion of North Central Kansas as they were in 2012, there was certainly a pronounced difference between western (drier) and eastern (wetter) areas. More specifically, much of Phillips and western Rooks counties again suffered notably below normal precipitation, while counties farther east such as Jewell and Mitchell fared considerably better, with near-normal to slightly above normal annual precipitation. As evidence of this, the driest cooperative observer site within the area during 2013 was one mile north of Long Island in Phillips County with only 13.57 inches (11.28 below normal), while the wettest site was Jewell in Jewell County with 28.39 inches (1.57 above normal). In general, however, most of the six-county area received somewhere between 75-100% of 30-year normal precipitation.

Drought in PHILLIPS, KANSAS
From 01-DEC-13 00:00:00 to 31-DEC-13 23:59:00 (CST-6)
Property damage: 0.00K
Crop damage: 0.00K
Reported by: Drought Monitor

Drought in ROOKS, KANSAS
From 01-DEC-13 00:00:00 to 31-DEC-13 23:59:00 (CST-6)
Property damage: 0.00K
Crop damage: 0.00K
Reported by: Drought Monitor