Drought

[Lolothai]

Hi, I live near Ratchaburi, this year we got only 4 or 5 days of heavy rain and maybe 2 weeks maximum of rain. The last 2 years have been very hot and dry, I would like to know if anyone else got this problem. I feel like it's raining all around our place but in a tiny 2 km radius it doesn't, is that even possible?

[carlyai]

Sorry for your trouble. I think it's possible with wet season storms. See lots of storm clouds around but sometimes no rain.

Seems the weather pattern has changed to one of them lanino or or one of them, so best look up what this means for us here in Thailand.

You could go to one of the Thai local provincial geo people, find out what aquifier  you are on and sink a 30 -60 m bore. 

 

 

 

[Lolothai]

10 minutes ago, carlyai said:

Sorry for your trouble. I think it's possible with wet season storms. See lots of storm clouds around but sometimes no rain.

Seems the weather pattern has changed to one of them lanino or or one of them, so best look up what this means for us here in Thailand.

You could go to one of the Thai local provincial geo people, find out what aquifier  you are on and sink a 30 -60 m bore. 

 

 

 

Thanks for your answer, just at border of my fence they tried to install a 30 meters water tank and dug to get water, I don't know how deep but it didn't work. The water tank/pump is left here rotting, quite expensive mistake by the way. We are on a slope from a hill around 300-500 meters, we get our water from there, as sometimes it's raining there we get a bit pressure and we can water the garden (2600 m2). Next to our land the neighbor planted mai sak over 12 rai, they are fed with dripping hose system, still they grow very slowly. It seems the rest of the country suffered too but I can see the rain all around us, especially in Ratchaburi city.

[RichCor]

Yea, very odd weather patterns. Last year we suffered a drought (dry wells) even while a nearby area was flooded. 

 

3 minutes ago, carlyai said:

You could go to one of the Thai local provincial geo people, find out what aquifier  you are on and sink a 30 -60 m bore.

Even with the Mekong River less than 6km away most of the local hand-dug wells went dry again this year. Our small village recently received a government project grant to create a new local water company and drill to access a deeper aquifer. Just paid 500thb for the mandatory water meter ...so will now have 5 sources of water (damn driven khlong, hand-dug well, new local baan water company, city water from Mekong river, bottled RO water) that each randomly drop out. 

[farmerjo]

Hang in there,tropical storm coming on the weekend.

 

[Lolothai]

could this strange weather being linked to the global warming/ world pollution?

[RichCor]

30 minutes ago, Lolothai said:

could this strange weather being linked to the global warming/ world pollution?

Given a dedicated study of the next 200 years and you'd be able to definitively say.

 

While I don't doubt that the rise of the human population on earth is having a profound impact, an area suffering a 50 year drought or 100 year floods isn't unheard of throughout recorded history. 

[farmerjo]

28 minutes ago, Lolothai said:

could this strange weather being linked to the global warming/ world pollution?

West of Khon Kaen we have had above average rain for the year.

It is mostly thunderstorm dependant rain as normal.

The rainfall figures tend to go with cycles here,so no i wouldn't put it down to warming,pollution. 

 

[Lolothai]

6 minutes ago, farmerjo said:

West of Khon Kaen we have had above average rain for the year.

It is mostly thunderstorm dependant rain as normal.

The rainfall figures tend to go with cycles here,so no i wouldn't put it down to warming,pollution. 

 

that's reassuring, so we can hope everything to go back to normal next year or next few years if unlucky

[douglasspade]

There is a 30km strip from Krasang along the Surin river border towards Satuek where rain has been less than usual. Rice crops are not doing too well. The rivers are so dry the cows wander through it.

Edited September 17, 2020 by douglasspade
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[Time to grow]

I live near Nakhon Sawan with a pond on the property. The pond is unlined and maintains it's water level with the water table. Prior to three years ago, the pond would rarely dry up and if it did, only briefly. Three years ago, we had an abundance of rain to the extent that the pond had to be pumped down to prevent erosion. Two years ago, the pond only filled up half way and dried up by October. This year, the pond has remained dry all year and to this day is bone dry. The neighbors are all digging deeper wells.

 

I have no doubt the changing weather patterns are a result of Climate Change and I suspect it is only going to get worse.

 

I have also noticed that rain showers are extremely localized. A village only about five miles away gets far more rain than we do.

[carlyai]

17 hours ago, farmerjo said:

Hang in there,tropical storm coming on the weekend.

 

It started raining from the storm here last night (K uchinari area) and been raining on and off. The sort of rain you get when on the outskirts of a tropical low.

[Time to grow]

I should have also mentioned, we have a hand dug well on the property. The well is nine meters deep. This well has never dried up before. It is not dry now but the water level has dropped below the pumping capacity of the centrifugal pump for the first time ever. I have ordered a submersible pump that will buy us some time but the writing is on the wall.

 

Absent an extended period of extreme wet weather in the very near future, this next year is going to be very dry for us. I don't see it happening. The water table is too low already to be replenished with the remaining wet season.

[Dario]

I think, the drought is nationwide. We are here in northern Surin province and the rice is dying. When it rains (almost every day) it rains anytime from 5 to 20 minutes. That is not enough to penetrate deep into the ground. But just this night rain started to set in, when I got up at 05:00 the rain was really torrential. Now at 09:52 it is just drizzeling. Anyway, it was enough today that everybody went out with fertilizer this morning (second round now). We're just about to leave to Bangkok for a tennis tournament our daughter is competing in. It might be rain all the way today.

"First time this year!" my wife just said.

 

[rickudon]

North east of Udon Thani sufficient rain so far, rice looking good. Last 2 years we have had heavy rain in July and August but little rest of the wet season - although last year we had quite a bit of flooding around our ponds and banks didn't dry out until October!

 

This year similar - 80-90% of our rain in late July and August - so far in September  only enough to keep the ponds topped up, no over flow (most years we do get some overflow). The long periods of light monsoon rain seem to be a thing of the past - rain is more irregular now.

 

Had a pond dug out early 2019 and about 4 metres deep - only dropped about one metre before this wet season so i expect will always have water for some irrigation, if we decide to install it. So far just use a hose with the pond water to water new trees and a few other plants, new rice field next to pond only needed irrigating a couple of times and another pond did that.

 

But 20 kilometres west of us they have had little rain......

[PGSan]

20 hours ago, Lolothai said:

30 meters water tank

A real giant ! 

 

20 hours ago, RichCor said:

Even with the Mekong River less than 6km away most of the local hand-dug wells went dry

No leaks in our river !  Lucky?

[1FinickyOne]

we have had similar in my Central village... some of it has to do w/rain patterns going around a mtn... but still... dry is scary... 

[Lolothai]

8 minutes ago, PGSan said:

A real giant ! 

 

No leaks in our river !  Lucky?

 

[Lolothai]

I had huge eucalyptus before, that I measure at 25 meters, the tank seems a bit taller.

[Stevemercer]

Very dry in our parts (half way between Mahasarakham and Khon Kaen). Rainfall has been well below average for the last 3 years.

 

Today's storm has put about 20 cm into my ponds, but they are still only about 50% full (normally 100% by the end of the wet season).

 

I often think that dry-land rice cropping will be finished within 5 years if the trend of drier wet seasons continue. Underground irrigation may keep things gasping along for a few more years.

 

Maybe in 10 years drought will almost be the norm.

[Jonnapat]

Where I live in Nakhon Sawan us exactly as you describe. 

Easily the lowest amount of rainfall since I have lived here.

[BoganInParasite]

Somewhat blessed here in northern Nan province in that the mountain ranges either side of the Nan River get adequate rain nearly every year and provide a year round outflow for farming. Having said that I've noticed that this year and last only a minority of rain has arrived on the south west monsoon winds. Last year the bulk came from the SCS courtesy of some tropical storms that moved westward. This year the bulk has come from the NNW direction, down from the eastern edge of the Tibet plateau then across southern China and northern Myanmar. Some has come on the south west monsoon. Looks like we will miss out on the rain from the current tropical storm. Our summer storm season this year was a bust.

[kickstart]

On 9/17/2020 at 2:41 PM, farmerjo said:

Hang in there,tropical storm coming on the weekend.

 

It  landed on us at about 8 am, Lopburi  ,unusual   for any rain early in the morning, early evening it started to rain hard ,and is still raining  hard now, it will be 40-50 mm, the rainy season has finally got to us this year.but it has taken a tropical storm ,end of July the clouds were seeded by two aeroplanes ,2 hour latter 28 mm of rain, very little rain that's  come on its own ,so to speak .  

Two days ago we had 50 mm of rain in 45 minutes ,first rain in two weeks, like others 9-12 km away no rain ,or just a light shower ,seems showers are getting more localized .

Our pond dried up back in the spring ,after a very short rainy season last year it was only half full ,we use the water to irrigate the garden ,first time it has been empty for such a long time since we moved here 10 years ago. 

The rain we have had made the grass grow in the pond ,so we put an electric fence round it and put the cattle in ,kept them happy for a few hours ,again first time we have done this since moving here.  

 

[Max Brok]

Believe it or not, I live in The Netherlands and have the same problems as Thailand. Have 3 years on a row lack of water in the summer time and warm winters with much rain. My garden is a dessert with a brown lawn and ground water level meters lower as normal. Last week we have 30 C degrees for 3 day and will be around 25 C up till Wednesday. We, known as The Lowlands, know how to keep the water out but don not know how to keep the water in. Same problem as Thailand.