U.S. drought coverage is on the rise after reaching a four-year low last month.

Participants: Rod Bain and USDA meteorologist Brad Rippey.

Transcript

June was a noteworthy month in the US drought monitor reporting in that we reached a four year low in US drought coverage.

That minimum was achieved on June 11th.

At that point, just 11.8 percent of the country was in drought.

Yet USDA meteorologist Brad Rippey says since that point, drought coverage has increased nationwide.

By the time we moved into July 2nd, drought coverage has increased to 18.7 percent of the country.

That's the highest that we've seen since back in mid-March, and that represents a 6.1 percentage point increase from late May and a 6.9 percentage point increase from that minimum on June 11th.

The expanding drought coverage is more impressive, according to Rippey, when factoring in the abnormally dry categories.

However, mostly low end drought coverage is found in extreme to exceptional drought.

I'm Rod Bain reporting for the US Department of Agriculture in Washington, D.C.