Recent Rain Offers Little Help For Table Rock Lake

[Phil Lilley]

You’d think last week’s intense downpour would have helped refill Table Rock Lake, even at least a little.But that didn’t happen, says Lake Manager Greg Oller. The lake was still dropping slightly a day after parts of the Ozarks saw some flooding and as much as an inch and a half of rain.

Read more....

http://www.news-leader.com/article/20120823/LIFE06/308230044/table-rock-lake-water-levels-drought-boating?odyssey=mod|newswell|text|FRONTPAGE|s

[Quillback]

The weatherman (for what it's worth) was saying last night that we might have a chance of remnants from the hurricane that's brewing in the gulf making it up here.

[Wayne SW/MO]

I think the aquifer is too dry to allow much real run off. I know that my ground goes dry below the depth of weed roots in just a couple of days. With the ground dry and then the limestone a few inches under it soaking up more there isn't much left really. The "experts" say that it can take a couple of years of normal rain to dampen the sup soil enough to allow the top soil to retain moisture and for rivers to return to normal.

We can all hope that Isaac moves a little west and comes up this way. Just not with the ferocity of Ike. Apparently most models have it missing us however.

[skeeter]

Phil, If the rain you are referring to last week was the one that NOAA issued the severe T-Storm warning for, we heard that was only over around the Indian Point and Dam area that it poured. Here in the mid-Lake area we got our usual four inches that day.......four inches between drops that is !!! Still, we have had more rain in August than in any other month this year except March when we got that 3 & 1/2"downpour.

Talked to two local guys in the excavator business about eight weeks ago that said it was dry back then all the way down to 5 feet below ground. Like Wayne posted, it's going to take a lot to reverse this extreme drought. Maybe the return to the developing El Nino conditions in the Eastern Pacific will bring us some moisture because the moisture from the Gulf has been shut off for many Months.