Forecast

Goodbye, La Niña? Eric Snodgrass Dissects What the Shift Means for Weather This Spring and Summer

Mon, 17 Mar 2025 17:09:56 GMT

La Niña is weakening, and the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Association (NOAA) expects neutral conditions to develop in the next month . But even with La Niña fading, meteorologists are still concerned about drought this spring and summer.

NOAA this week said forecasters expect ENSO-neutral conditions to develop in the next month and persist through the Northern Hemisphere’s summer. According to NOAA, La Niña’s signature is cooler-than-average surface water in the east-central tropical Pacific, stronger-than-average trade winds, and drier conditions over the central Pacific.

ENSO-neutral means conditions could be close to average, but Eric Snodgrass, Nutrien’s principal atmospheric scientist, says that doesn’t mean the weather will be normal this spring and summer.

“I do expect changes,” Snodgrass says. “Think about it like this: The previous winter was an El Niño winter, and it was very mild and very wet. So, we got into spring ’24 with tons of moisture. I mean, Iowa, Minnesota and South Dakota flooded out. Then we had this incredibly dry fall as the La Niña began, and it reached a peak twice. It actually hit a peak in December, and then a secondary peak about a month later at the end of January. It’s been fading ever since. The big question is, as we go into neutral conditions for this upcoming growing season, is it going to be one that paints a picture of precipitation extremes? Did it leave us with any sort of kind of problems from winter that are carrying over?”

Snodgrass says the severe weather outbreaks on Friday, that brought high winds, dust storms and wildfire warnings across the Plains, is a reminder how dry it is in the Southwest.

“We’ve got major pockets of the country that are still dealing with some pretty big drought conditions. It is fading, and that is a signal we have to pay attention to,” Snodgrass says.

USDA meteorologist Brad Rippey is also concerned about what impact the shifting pattern will have on farmers this spring. But it’s not just the dryness. It’s also the fact areas are getting inundated with rains that could pose problems.

“With this stormy weather pattern in place, that is going to create some difficulty for spring field work in some areas. It looks like the primary storm track may be through parts of the middle of the country extending into the lower Midwest and eventually the interior northeast. That is one area where we already have fairly wet conditions,” Rippey says.

How sea surface temperatures in the Niño-3.4 region of the tropical Pacific changed over the course of all La Niña events since 1950 (gray lines) and 2024-25 (black line). This shows the traditional calculation for Niño-3.4, the monthly temperature compared to the most recent 30-year average (1991–2020 for the 2024 line). By this measure, the La Niña threshold was crossed in December 2024, but La Niña remains weak.

(NOAA)

La Niñas and El Niños Are Strongest in the Winter
Snodgrass points out La Niñas and El Niños are always strongest in Northern Hemisphere’s winter, which means they fade in spring and summer.

While La Niña-like conditions were a trademark in late fall, we didn’t reach the official definition of La Niña until January.

“The atmosphere way back in November was already treating our winter timeframe like a La Niña,” Snodgrass says. So, we were getting the influences of it as it comes in and goes out. And now the question is, what’s it going to do?”

February 2025 sea surface temperature compared to the 1985-1993 average. The surface of the east-central tropical Pacific is slightly below average temperature, but much of the global ocean remains warmer than average.

(NOAA )

“This is a great map to look at,” Snodgrass says, referencing the map above. “If you focus right in the middle, you see the large area of the cooler colors. Our line is now shifting to the central and West Pacific and behind it over by South America. All of the warmer water is beginning to emerge. And that’s what’s killing it because there’s a trade wind across that area from the east to the west. We’re going to watch this fade carefully during the spring. But the question is: Do we get winter’s leftovers?”

What Fueled the Dryness This Winter?
During the winter, Snodgrass points out there was no subtropical jet. That’s what fueled drought in the Southwest and Northwest.

“I’m actually kind of worried about the beginning of April having another shot at cold air after what we’ve been experiencing in March, which has been so very, very mild. Then you say, well, we’ve had so much dry air in place. Are we still worried about more dry air coming back? To be honest, these big storm systems coming through the central U.S., if we could get four, maybe five more of those by early April, we’re going to hate it. It’s nasty weather. It’s not fun, and it’s dangerous, but it returns moisture. That could be part of the mix of things, including the fading of La Niña that could help bring us away from these major early season drought risk scenarios.”

55% of corn production, 46% of soybean production, 33% of the cotton growing area and 27% of the winter wheat production are currently experiencing drought.

(U.S. Drought Monitor )

Growing Drought Concerns
What if it doesn’t? What if we don’t see more of this severe weather hit the Southwest and Plains, and moisture remains absent as we get into the height of spring? Well, the area will enter into the height of the growing season dry and reduce their chances of seeing moisture this summer.

“That’s a box we check every spring,” Snodgrass says. “If the drought monitor saw a reduction in drought over winter, then that gives us a different look for spring. But what we see here is two-thirds of the country in some stage of drought, including the abnormally dry category. But it’s the epicenters of drought that are so concerning. Look at the Western Corn Belt. Look at the Southwest. We just wonder if that funnels into the Mississippi Valley as we go forward.”

At the same time some areas are seeing drought, Kentucky, southern Indiana, southern Illinois, Tennessee, Arkansas and the boot heel of Missouri are all experiencing heavy rains and flooding.

“By May 11, I want to know what the drought monitor map looks like. If it looks no different, then I’m going to be sounding alarms going into summer with concerns this will start to creep and move because as soon as we get into the summer weather, all we get is convective storms pop off. And what do they do? They just locally deliver rain - not big broad swaths of it,” Snodgrass says.

Tale of Two Weather Scenarios
He says the forecast leading up to May 11 is a tale of two weather patterns, with the Mississippi River being the dividing line for moisture.

“If you are along it and east of it, I think we’re going to have tight windows to plant. You could include a little bit more of Missouri, Iowa and Minnesota in that as well,” Snodgrass says. “I think we’re going to see repeated storm systems. The best moisture is east. It keeps avoiding that southern plains area.”

What to Watch: Where the Storm Chasers End Up
Snodgrass says if storm chasers are busying chasing severe weather across the Ohio Valley, the mid-south and the southeast, but not in Kansas and the Plains, that’s a key indicator there’s a problem with the moisture getting back into the plains.

“If it’s not there by the time we start June, it’s very difficult to rely on the atmosphere to return it once you get into the summer months if you live in the central plains, which is where they could build from,” he adds.

To watch the complete discussion with Snodgrass, visit Farm Journal TV and take advantage of the free trial.

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Ag Meterologists Worry More Drought Lies Ahead For Spring

Summer 2024 Predicted to Bring on the Heat

Mon, 29 Apr 2024 18:58:44 GMT

Bust out the sunscreen and cattle misters. It’s gonna be a hot one this summer if USDA meteorological predictions are correct.

Dr. Dennis Todey, Director of the USDA Midwest Climate Hub , shared on a recent webinar sponsored by the Iowa Farm Bureau Federation that current weather patterns are signaling excessive summer heat ahead.

He said the outlook for July, August, and September is for above-average temperatures in virtually the entire country. The areas showing the greatest likelihood for above-average temperatures are the western third of the country -- minus a band on the far west coast that includes most of California – and the upper New England states.

The precipitation outlook, on the other hand, is neutral, except for a two-to-three-states-deep region along the entire eastern seaboard, which models show having a likelihood of above-average precipitation.

Todey said there are strong signals that the U.S. is in a “rapid transition” between a strong “El Nino” weather pattern to an equally prominent “La Nina” pattern – a shift that will likely occur sometime between June and August 2024.

The current El Nino was short-lived, lasting only about a year, and followed 3 years of a La Nina pattern. El Nino patterns are typically associated with mild winters. This was certainly the case in 23-24, which posted near-record warmest winter temperatures in December, January, and February. The states with the most pronounced warmth compared to normal winter temps included North Dakota, Minnesota, Wisconsin, Michigan, New York, and the New England states up to Maine.

La Nina is the opposite counterpart of El Nino. In its most recent, 3-year stretch, it coincided with dry weather in a large part of the country. Todey said Iowa – the nation’s largest corn-producing state – has been in a consistent D1 (moderate) drought since July 2021, a record length for the USDA Drought Monitor.

As of the first week of April 2024, pockets of “Extreme” drought were noted by the Drought Monitor in Iowa, Montana, New Mexico, and Texas. Southeastern New Mexico also has an area of “Exceptional” drought, which is the highest categorization of drought status by the Drought Monitor.

“We can’t say for sure whether the next La Nina will perpetuate dry conditions, but there is also no strong indicator of precipitation,” noted Todey. “We will likely be very reliant on getting rainfalls at the right time through the summer.”

The meteorologist has observed an interesting shift in precipitation patterns that is affecting growing seasons. “In terms of temperatures, we’re seeing an increase in growing season length by about 10 days per decade,” he noted. “At the same time, there has been a 20-year trend of midsummer dryness, with more annual rainfall arriving in the spring.”

Coming out of a warm winter is affecting moisture levels on hand. Todey said the lack of frozen soils allowed moisture to absorb more readily – the good news. But the bad news is that warmer temps caused evapo-transpiration to occur at a higher rate. Essentially, the two factors cancelled each other out.

“Iowa is currently at ground-zero for driest soil conditions,” he declared. “While not as widespread, some of those conditions also exist in parts of Missouri and Kansas. It seems probable that we’ll need to preserve moisture this year.”

Looking toward the planting season and beyond, Todey offered the following advice:

Pull back on yield goals for crop projections and inputs. Lackluster soil moisture recovery could limit the effectiveness of fertilizer.
Plant as early as possible to take advantage of spring moisture.
Reduce tillage – every time you do a tillage pass, you lose moisture.
Closely monitor well and groundwater sources upon which you rely for livestock and/or irrigation, so you can proactively develop alternative plans if necessary.

The full webinar and additional comments from Todey can be viewed here .

For more on weather, read:

The U.S. Now Has a Nearly 90% Chance of Seeing El Niño This Summer

Wed, 24 May 2023 18:52:06 GMT

La Niña’s punishing drought left scars that will be etched in the minds of farmers in the West and Plains for years to come. As El Niño looks to make its grand return, significant weather changes could be on deck for U.S. farmers this year.

USDA’s May crop production forecast already incorporated some of the positive weather developments, penciling in record national yields of 181.5 bu. per acre for corn yield and 52 bu. per acre on soybeans.

“The thing you’ve got to remember about the new crop balance sheet is that everything in all of the new crop balance sheets is contingent on weather,” said Joe Vaclavik of Standard Grain. “USDA is assuming normal or favorable weather in regard to crop production.”

(Farm Journal)

The biggest change is El Niño, which is associated with a band of warm ocean water that develops in the central and east-central equatorial Pacific. Forecasters at NOAA are watching the weather transition closely, and watching the timing of when the full weather development will hit the U.S.

“The signs of El Niño development that we saw last month have only grown stronger this month,” NOAA said in a blog post this week . “Additionally, we’ve pushed one more month through the dreaded spring predictability barrier. Taken together, these signals have allowed forecasters to increase their forecast confidence this month, with the likelihood of El Niño approaching 90% by summer and exceeding 90% through next fall and winter.”

(Farm Journal)

NOAA says the April average sea surface temperature in the Niño-3.4 region, which is the primary monitoring region for ENSO, was 0.1 °C above the long-term average, which covers 1991-2020. NOAA says that value is up 0.2 °C from March and is the first time the monthly Niño-3.4 temperature was warmer than average since April of 2020.

While most headlines highlight how it can bring historic heat around the globe, agricultural meteorologist Eric Snodgrass says it also tends to bring favorable growing conditions for crops in the Midwest.

“Should it manifest itself and be the most dominant, what we call teleconnection in the pattern, we would likely be seeing a better year overall,” said Snodgrass, the Principal Atmospheric Scientist with Nutrien Ag Solutions.

Will the summer weather be like any other in history? Drew Lerner, founder and president of World Weather, cautions farmers to be careful, because it all depends on timing.

“The El Niño for 2023 will be developing and not established which is why we [World Weather, Inc.] believe the drier bias may be farther to the west in the Midwest this year due to the strong influence of negative PDO and the more underdeveloped influence from El Niño,” he said.

(Farm Journal)

As El Niño continues to creep into the picture, Snodgrass says El Niño summers tend to produce strong crop yields.

“Since 1970, we’ve had 17 El Niño summers and 14 of them had trendline yields slightly above that. This means we generally think of El Niño summers of having a more juicy atmosphere, or more stuff for thunderstorms, so we’ll keep a close eye on it,” he says.

That greenhouse-like growing weather won’t be the case across the U.S. Lerner says the summer will likely have a warmer and drier bias across the Plains, the western Corn Belt and into the Great Lakes region.

“Shots of cooler air will move through the eastern Midwest in late May, late June and late August. The west may cool down for a little while, but it should heat back up faster than the eastern Midwest,” says Lerner. “The northern Plains will be wetter biased in the balance of May and early June with the wetter bias shifting to the west and north during July and August. That should favor Montana, western and northern Dakota and areas to the north. The southern Plains (favoring Texas) will be a little wetter biased in late May and early June and again during August and September.”

Lerner said the states he’s most worried about in terms of summer moisture are Iowa, Missouri, Nebraska and Kansas He thinks the best chance of moisture could fall across northern Plains, upper Midwest and eastern most corn belt, the southeastern states, the lower Delta, Texas and a part of southern Oklahoma.

“There is a strong association with abating multi-year La Niña events that occur in this solar cycle with negative Pacific Decadal Oscillation (PDO) with below average Midwest precipitation,” Lerner said. “This trend tends to occur in most spring seasons when these conditions have been present. However, the bias tends to be more significant in the central and eastern Midwest than in the western Midwest. Western Midwest weather tends to be wetter in these years than areas farther to the east and we are likely to see a short-term increase in western Midwest precipitation in the balance of May until the summer ridge evolves and begins to prevail.”

Punishing Drought Now Expected to Persist Through July Across Texas, Plains

Fri, 21 Apr 2023 13:05:34 GMT

The updated Seasonal Drought Outlook for the U.S. is painting a grim picture for many drought-plagued areas of the Plains. While the National Weather Service (NWS) forecasts drought to persist from Kansas to Texas, forecasters also expect drought to improve in parts of Nebraska and Iowa and even disappear in some areas.

The NWS Climate Prediction Center points out the drought situation across the country has dramatically improved for many areas. The U.S. Drought Monitor shows drought is currently near its lowest point since July 2020. Drought peaked in October of 2022 at nearly 63% of the country, and since then, it’s steadily declined across much of the West, northern Great Plains, Midwest, Tennessee and Ohio Valleys.

(Farm Journal)

Areas of the country seeing relentless drought conditions growing even worse are western Kansas, western Oklahoma and the western half of Texas. This week’s Seasonal Drought Outlook indicates those geographies hardest-hit by drought won’t see much change through July.

“Persistence is more likely for southeast Colorado and much of Kansas with drought so well entrenched in these areas that improvement will be difficult,” the Seasonal Drought Outlook stated. “The highest confidence for removal exists across the Dakotas, Nebraska, eastern Montana and Wyoming.”

Agricultural meteorologist Eric Snodgrass thinks parts of Kansas, Nebraska and Colorado could see better chances for precipitation as we head into May. He thinks those increased chances of could also fall across Oklahoma and Texas.

“This is going to be something we’re going to watch very, very carefully because of the extensive drought in that area,” says Snodgrass, the Principal Atmospheric Scientist with Nutrien Ag Solutions. “So, we have to kind of balance it out. Right. We need the moisture in those areas. We need the moisture in the western Corn Belt, but it is slowing down some of this early season fieldwork.”

Drought Conditions Continue to Worsen

Fri, 13 Nov 2020 15:36:25 GMT

Drought conditions are continuing to grow and frozen precipitation this weekend won’t help matters. Meterologist Matt Yarosewick has the latest. Just click on the video link to watch his forecast.

2025 Weather: Drought and Root Zone Maps Signal Dryness Ahead

As 2024 comes to an end, roughly 70% of the nation is experiencing some level of drought and dryness.

Recent precipitation led to small improvements in parts of Oklahoma and Arkansas northeast to the Central Appalachians. Since its peak in September, the drought affecting the Central Appalachians and Upper Ohio Valley has steadily improved.

In the northeast, near to above-normal precipitation in the past 30 days means drought conditions have improved.

Across the Southeast, Lower Mississippi Valley and Texas, precipitation deficits continue to increase.

December is typically a drier time of year for the Upper Midwest and Northern to Central Great Plains.

Since the beginning of October, precipitation has generally averaged below normal across the Central Rockies, Great Basin, Southwest and southern California.

Northwest California and much of the Pacific Northwest have experienced wetter-than-normal conditions.

When it comes to severe or extreme drought, parts of the Northern Plains, the Southwest and the Tennessee Valley fall in those categories. Portions of the Midwest are now considered D1/moderate drought, and one-fifth of Indiana is in D2/severe drought.

Looking at various crop production areas, the following are currently affected by drought:

Barley, 35%
Corn, 54%
Cotton, 18%
Durum wheat, 70%
Peanut, 29%
Rice, 15%
Sorghum, 31%
Soybean, 47%
Spring wheat, 33%
Sugarbeet, 48%
Sunflower, 78%
Winter wheat, 27%

While the drought monitor looks longer term, NASA’s root zone soil moisture map shows just how dry it is in the top 3’ of soil across the Corn Belt and Southwest.

The Dec. 23, 2024, root zone soil moisture map shows just how dry it is in the top 3’ of soil across parts of the Corn Belt and Southwest.

(NASA)

Eric Snodgrass, principal atmospheric scientist at Conduit Ag, says the current La Nina is weak and fading, but it continues to influence weather patterns, which is sending warning signs for spring.

Snodgrass says we’re missing one important component in the atmosphere — the subtropical jet stream, which comes from Hawaii.

“We have the polar jet in place that will drive really cold air into the New Year, especially into the eastern two-thirds of the country, really cold air for probably a while,” Snodgrass says. “Until we crank the jet stream out of the Southwest, it’s hard to return a lot of moisture and break the fear of drought spreading from Mexico or from the western High Plains, which I think is where it’s going to come from next year.”

Snodgrass is worried about drought for two reasons:

Drought conditions are developing in Mexico, the western Plains, the High Plains and all the way up to Canada.
In six of the past 10 years with a really dry fall, the spring to follow was also dry. That causes concern for a big chunk of the Plains and into the Midwest.

Snodgrass says the best opportunity for a pattern shift would be if La Nina breaks down in the next few weeks and transitions to a more neutral pattern heading into spring.

Eric Snodgrass is on the agenda for Top Producer Summit in February. Register today!

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Forecast

Goodbye, La Niña? Eric Snodgrass Dissects What the Shift Means for Weather This Spring and Summer

Summer 2024 Predicted to Bring on the Heat

For more on weather, read:

The U.S. Now Has a Nearly 90% Chance of Seeing El Niño This Summer

Punishing Drought Now Expected to Persist Through July Across Texas, Plains

Read More: Kansas Winter Wheat Crop Crippled by Drought that Covers 80% of the State

Drought Conditions Continue to Worsen

2025 Weather: Drought and Root Zone Maps Signal Dryness Ahead