Agrometeorology: Drought intensifies, forced ripening of summer crops expected

(Photo: Pixabay)

They wrote: the weather of the past week was largely characterized by sunny, warm weather with atmospheric dryness, and no precipitation fell at all. The total precipitation of the past 30 days was 20-60 millimeters below the multi-year average almost nationwide, with only a few spots affected by major cloudbursts receiving a satisfactory amount. In a large area between the Danube and Tisza rivers, not even 10 millimeters of precipitation has fallen since mid-July.

The area of the drought has both increased in extent and extent compared to a week ago

In more than half of the country, the moisture content of the upper half-meter layer does not reach 25 percent in proportion to the amount of water usable by plants, and the deeper soil layer has been extremely dry since mid-June. The average temperature has typically exceeded the long-term average by 2-4 degrees Celsius. The heat peaked on Sunday, when the maximum temperatures were between 35-40 degrees, and then on Monday only values ​​of around 30 degrees were measured, but since then warming has begun again. However, the temperature typically drops to around 15 degrees at night, which is partly due to the low humidity.

Summer plants are underdeveloped in many places, their green mass is much less than usual at this time of year

A very poor harvest is expected in a large area in the Great Plain, for example, corn has not formed ears in many places. However, there are regions where the outlook is still acceptable, for example, in the immediate vicinity of Miskolc, the waxing corn fields are still nice green, and the cobs are also showing well, while the sunflowers also have quite nice plates – they wrote.

According to the forecast, the weather is expected to be mostly dry and warm in the coming days, with the heat peaking on Saturday with maximums between 35-40 degrees

A cold front will arrive on Sunday, the temperature will drop by a few degrees, and showers and thunderstorms may occur mainly in the eastern part of the country. Warming will begin again at the beginning of next week, but in the second half of the week the temperature will start to decrease, and the chance of showers and thunderstorms will also increase. Until then, however, the extent and territorial extent of the agricultural drought is expected to increase, which will often be exacerbated by atmospheric drought. Due to strong UV radiation, the risk of sunburn of vegetables and fruits still exists.

MTI