Montana Drought With Sen Testor

Montana Drought With Sen Testor

Susan Allen
Susan Allen
07.21.17 Montana drought 5 sec

With your land and livestock Report, I'm Susan Allen. Like much of the west braces for another wildfire season, US Senator Jon Tester a farmer and democrat from Montana says the hot weather in Montana has especially challenged the last few weeks.

TESTOR: What's been interesting about this drought is that last fall we had so much moisture that it was incredible. Some of the places in Eastern Montana they had a hard time getting the crop in because it was so wet and muddy and then now it's a situation where since the end of June we have had 90 plus, 100 plus days.

The eastern third, maybe half of the state is in severe drought conditions to the point of what winter wheat is there they are cutting for hay and the Spring wheat just flat isn't doing anything it's just history. We were able to open up CRP for grazing and haying.

And he fears the Rocky mountains could become a tinderbox

TESTOR: If we ever get a storm with a bunch of lightning strikes and that's not if, that's when! Those whole Rocky Mountains with so many dead trees in it will be burning like crazy I don't know how they are going to handle it, The forest service and private landowners too.

Parts of the Senator's state have had had the driest stretch of weather since 1918. This drought has impacted more than a third of North Dakota and more than 10 percent of South Dakota. Western Colorado is now falling under the category of 'abnormally dry' according to the U.S. Drought Monitor.

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