Drought in Lavaca, Texas

Rainfall was a bit of a mixed bag in October. A swath of the central part of the area had 10-50% of normal. The area along the Rio Grande had 100-200% of normal. The rest of the area was in between. There was enough rainfall in Bandera County for that county to improve from Extreme (D3) drought to Severe (D2) drought. Lack of rain worsened the drought from D2 to D3 in Fayette and Gonzales Counties. All other counties remained where they were in September. Comal, Guadalupe, and Hays stayed in Exceptional (D4) drought. Bexar, Blanco, Caldwell, Kendall, and Medina remained in D3. Bastrop, Burnet, Gillespie, Kerr, Kinney, Lavaca, Llano, Real, Travis, Uvalde, Williamson, and Wilson stayed in D2. Of the counties in D2 or worse drought Comal, Guadalupe, Hays, Bexar, Blanco, Caldwell, Fayette, Gonzales, Kendall, Medina, Burnet, Gillespie, Llano, Travis, and Wilson had outdoor burn bans in effect at the end of the month. The 7-day average streamflow at the end of the month was normal (25%-75%) to below normal (10%-24%) on the Nueces River, much below normal (<10%) on the Frio River, below normal (10%-24%) on the Medina River, below normal (10%-24%) on the San Antonio River, much below normal (<10%) on the upper and lower Guadalupe River, and normal (25%-75%) to below normal (10%-24%) on the upper Colorado River. Area reservoirs were below normal pool level. Lake Amistad rose 4.5 feet, but was still 37.0 feel below normal. Medina Lake decreased 1.2 feet to 78.0 feet below normal and Lake Travis dropped 2.4 feet to 40.6 feet below normal. The Edwards Aquifer rose 2.3 feet, but was 33.2 feet below average. Most public water systems encouraged at least voluntary water restrictions and many had mandatory restrictions in effect. Some of the larger services had the following: New Braunfels Stage 1, San Antonio Stage 2, Austin Stage 1, and Kerrville Stage 1.