Challenges of Brush Management Treatment Effectiveness in Southern Great Plains, United States

2021 ◽  
Vol 77 ◽  
pp. 57-65
Author(s):  
Rheinhardt Scholtz ◽  
Samuel D. Fuhlendorf ◽  
Daniel R. Uden ◽  
Brady W. Allred ◽  
Matthew O. Jones ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
United States ◽  
Great Plains ◽  
Treatment Effectiveness ◽  
Southern Great Plains ◽  
Brush Management

scholarly journals Primary Atmospheric Drivers of Pluvial Years in the United States Great Plains

2018 ◽  
Vol 19 (4) ◽  
pp. 643-658 ◽  
Author(s):  
Paul X. Flanagan ◽  
Jeffrey B. Basara ◽  
Jason C. Furtado ◽  
Xiangming Xiao
Keyword(s):  
United States ◽  
Great Plains ◽  
Heavy Precipitation ◽  
The United States ◽  
Precipitation Variability ◽  
Northern Great Plains ◽  
Southern Great Plains ◽  
The Public ◽  
Moisture Fluxes ◽  
Precipitation Events

Abstract Precipitation variability has increased in recent decades across the Great Plains (GP) of the United States. Drought and its associated drivers have been studied in the GP region; however, periods of excessive precipitation (pluvials) at seasonal to interannual scales have received less attention. This study narrows this knowledge gap with the overall goal of understanding GP precipitation variability during pluvial periods. Through composites of relevant atmospheric variables from the ECMWF twentieth-century reanalysis (ERA-20C), key differences between southern Great Plains (SGP) and northern Great Plains (NGP) pluvial periods are highlighted. The SGP pluvial pattern shows an area of negative height anomalies over the southwestern United States with wind anomalies consistent with frequent synoptic wave passages along a southward-shifted North Pacific jet. The NGP pattern during pluvial periods, by contrast, depicts anomalously low heights in the northwestern United States and an anomalously extended Pacific jet. Analysis of daily heavy precipitation events reveals the key drivers for these pluvial events, namely, an east–west height gradient and associated stronger poleward moisture fluxes. Therefore, the results show that pluvial years over the GP are likely driven by synoptic-scale processes rather than by anomalous seasonal precipitation driven by longer time-scale features. Overall, the results present a possible pathway to predicting the occurrence of pluvial years over the GP and understanding the causes of GP precipitation variability, potentially mitigating the threats of water scarcity and excesses for the public and agricultural sectors.

scholarly journals A comparison of multiscale variations of decade-long cloud fractions from six different platforms over the Southern Great Plains in the United States

2014 ◽  
Vol 119 (6) ◽  
pp. 3438-3459 ◽  
Author(s):  
Wei Wu ◽  
Yangang Liu ◽  
Michael P. Jensen ◽  
Tami Toto ◽  
Michael J. Foster ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
United States ◽  
Great Plains ◽  
The United States ◽  
Southern Great Plains

Convective Modes for Significant Severe Thunderstorms in the Contiguous United States. Part I: Storm Classification and Climatology

2012 ◽  
Vol 27 (5) ◽  
pp. 1114-1135 ◽  
Author(s):  
Bryan T. Smith ◽  
Richard L. Thompson ◽  
Jeremy S. Grams ◽  
Chris Broyles ◽  
Harold E. Brooks
Keyword(s):  
United States ◽  
Great Plains ◽  
Radar Data ◽  
High Plains ◽  
Deep South ◽  
Southern Great Plains ◽  
Convective Systems ◽  
Severe Thunderstorms ◽  
Wind Events ◽  
Convective Mode

Abstract Radar-based convective modes were assigned to a sample of tornadoes and significant severe thunderstorms reported in the contiguous United States (CONUS) during 2003–11. The significant hail (≥2-in. diameter), significant wind (≥65-kt thunderstorm gusts), and tornadoes were filtered by the maximum event magnitude per hour on a 40-km Rapid Update Cycle model horizontal grid. The filtering process produced 22 901 tornado and significant severe thunderstorm events, representing 78.5% of all such reports in the CONUS during the sample period. The convective mode scheme presented herein begins with three radar-based storm categories: 1) discrete cells, 2) clusters of cells, and 3) quasi-linear convective systems (QLCSs). Volumetric radar data were examined for right-moving supercell (RM) and left-moving supercell characteristics within the three radar reflectivity designations. Additional categories included storms with marginal supercell characteristics and linear hybrids with a mix of supercell and QLCS structures. Smoothed kernel density estimates of events per decade revealed clear geographic and seasonal patterns of convective modes with tornadoes. Discrete and cluster RMs are the favored convective mode with southern Great Plains tornadoes during the spring, while the Deep South displayed the greatest variability in tornadic convective modes in the fall, winter, and spring. The Ohio Valley favored a higher frequency of QLCS tornadoes and a lower frequency of RM compared to the Deep South and the Great Plains. Tornadoes with nonsupercellular/non-QLCS storms were more common across Florida and the high plains in the summer. Significant hail events were dominated by Great Plains supercells, while variations in convective modes were largest for significant wind events.

scholarly journals Monitoring Drought over the Conterminous United States Using MODIS and NCEP Reanalysis-2 Data

2010 ◽  
Vol 49 (8) ◽  
pp. 1665-1680 ◽  
Author(s):  
Yunjun Yao ◽  
Shunlin Liang ◽  
Qiming Qin ◽  
Kaicun Wang
Keyword(s):  
United States ◽  
Spatial Resolution ◽  
Great Plains ◽  
Land Surface ◽  
Remote Sensing Data ◽  
Moisture Stress ◽  
Ncep Reanalysis ◽  
Southern Great Plains ◽  
Moderate Resolution ◽  
Moderate Resolution Imaging Spectroradiometer

Abstract Monitoring land surface drought using remote sensing data is a challenge, although a few methods are available. Evapotranspiration (ET) is a valuable indicator linked to land drought status and plays an important role in surface drought detection at continental and global scales. In this study, the evaporative drought index (EDI), based on the estimated actual ET and potential ET (PET), is described to characterize the surface drought conditions. Daily actual ET at 4-km resolution for April–September 2003–05 across the continental United States is estimated using a simple improved ET model with input solar radiation acquired by Moderate-Resolution Imaging Spectroradiometer (MODIS) at a spatial resolution of 4 km and input meteorological parameters from NCEP Reanalysis-2 data at a spatial resolution of 32 km. The PET is also calculated using some of these data. The estimated actual ET has been rigorously validated with ground-measured ET at six Enhanced Facility sites in the Southern Great Plains (SGP) of the Atmosphere Radiation Measurement Program (ARM) and four AmeriFlux sites. The validation results show that the bias varies from −11.35 to 27.62 W m−2 and the correlation coefficient varies from 0.65 to 0.86. The monthly composites of EDI at 4-km resolution during April–September 2003–05 are found to be in good agreement with the Palmer Z index anomalies, but the advantage of EDI is its finer spatial resolution. The EDI described in this paper incorporates information about energy fluxes in response to soil moisture stress without requiring too many meteorological input parameters, and performs well in assessing drought at continental scales.

scholarly journals Drought and Pluvial Dipole Events within the Great Plains of the United States

2015 ◽  
Vol 54 (9) ◽  
pp. 1886-1898 ◽  
Author(s):  
Jordan Christian ◽  
Katarina Christian ◽  
Jeffrey B. Basara
Keyword(s):  
United States ◽  
Standard Deviation ◽  
Great Plains ◽  
Spatial Scales ◽  
The United States ◽  
Northern Great Plains ◽  
High Plains ◽  
Southern Great Plains ◽  
One Year ◽  
The U.S

AbstractThe purpose of this study was to quantify dipole events (a drought year followed by a pluvial year) for various spatial scales including the nine Oklahoma climate divisions and the author-defined regions of the U.S. Southern Great Plains (SGP), High Plains (HP), and Northern Great Plains (NGP). Analyses revealed that, on average, over twice as many standard deviation (STDEV) dipoles existed in the latter half of the dataset (1955–2013) relative to the first half (1896–1954), suggesting that dramatic increases in precipitation from one year to the next within the Oklahoma climate divisions are increasing with time. For the larger regions within the Great Plains of the United States, the percent chance of a significant pluvial year following a significant drought year was approximately 25% of the time for the SGP and NGP and approximately 16% of the time for the HP. The STDEV dipole analyses further revealed that the frequency of dipoles was consistent between the first and second half of the dataset for the NGP and HP but was increasing with time in the SGP. The temporal periods of anomalous precipitation during relative pluvial years within the STDEV dipole events were unique for each region whereby October occurred most frequently (70%) within the SGP, September occurred most frequently (60%) within the HP, and May occurred most frequently (62%) within the NGP.

The Temporal Evolution of Convective Indices in Storm-Producing Environments

2008 ◽  
Vol 23 (5) ◽  
pp. 786-794 ◽  
Author(s):  
Timothy J. Wagner ◽  
Wayne F. Feltz ◽  
Steven A. Ackerman
Keyword(s):  
United States ◽  
Temporal Resolution ◽  
Great Plains ◽  
Wind Shear ◽  
Temporal Evolution ◽  
The United States ◽  
Severe Weather ◽  
Wind Profiler ◽  
Southern Great Plains ◽  
Tornadic Storms

Abstract Temporal changes in stability and shear associated with the development of thunderstorms are quantified using the enhanced temporal resolution of combined Atmospheric Emitted Radiance Interferometer (AERI) thermodynamic profile retrievals and National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) 404-MHz wind profiler observations. From 1999 to 2003, AERI systems were collocated with NOAA wind profilers at five sites in the southern Great Plains of the United States, creating a near-continuous dataset of atmospheric soundings in both the prestorm and poststorm environments with a temporal resolution of up to 10 min between observations. Median values for several standard severe weather indices were calculated for tornadic storms and nontornadic supercells. It was found that instability generally increases throughout the preconvective period, reaching a peak roughly 1 h before a tornado forms or a nontornadic supercell forms large hail. Wind shear for both tornadic and nontornadic storms starts to increase roughly 3 h before storm time. However, indices are highly variable between time and space and may not be representative of the environment at large.

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