Keeping an Eye on Rita

Hopefully, the destruction that hurricane Rita will wreak upon coastal Texas will be minimal; but I am selfishly hoping that when it develops into a tropical depression that it will pass over southwest Missouri like many experts are predicting. In 1998 when hurricane Frances hit the Texas coast and headed north through Oklahoma and Kansas, many areas in its inland path received up to 14" of rain. Springfield reported 2" of rain from hurricane Frances even though the bulk of the storm stalled out around 200 miles to the west in central Kansas. It doesn't take an expert to realize that a 9" to 14" rainfall wouldn't exactly be great for the area, especially here in flood-prone Springfield, but at least it would most certainly set our rainfall ledger even for the year after our significant summer drought. However, it is hard for the soil to soak up that much rain in a short amount of time and undoubtedly the bulk of the rainwater would be diverted to our ponds, waterways, and reservoirs. This is obviously great news for us duck hunters. Let's say we can get even 10" over a widespread area in a 48 hour time span; not only would it immediately raise our local lake levels to power pool and above, but the soil would be so saturated that any concurrent rain in the next several weeks would not be able to be absorbed and would therefore flood the rivers and reservoirs.

I have come to realize that actual duck population estimates that the USFWS spend so much time on have little to do with hunting success. Local habitat and weather conditions are the key difference makers in any given year no matter the flyway. Last year's hunting season could not be a more convincing argument for this theory. Duck numbers were down all across the board, but our (western Missouri) habitat couldn't have been better; which resulted in most hunters having one of the best seasons of their lives.

First, let's hope that hurricane Rita will not take one human life and that it will have a limited effect on property and the environment. From there maybe it will deliver the toad-strangler we have needed for a while; a good two to three day rain might set us up for another memorable waterfowl season.

Until next time.