According to the latest Oklahoma drought monitor report, exceptional drought remains at zero percent, unchanged from the start of the calendar year.

Extreme drought or worse conditions remain at zero percent, unchanged since the week of October 29, 2024.

Severe drought or worse conditions are unchanged at 0.33 percent, since January 2.

Moderate drought or worse conditions have increased to 18.43 percent, up from 7.75 percent last week. At this point a year ago- Oklahoma has at 3.23 percent in moderate drought.

Abnormally dry or worse conditions have increased to 80.89, up from 65.73 percent last week. At this time a year ago- we were at 30.8 percent.

As for our neighbors, the greatest rain occurred across the coastal areas of east Texas, and Louisiana. Due to ongoing hydrological drought issues in south Texas, drought expanded this week with more moderate, severe and extreme drought conditions. Abnormally dry conditions were improved over east Texas but were not removed completely due to some lingering dryness being observed at longer timescales. The recent rains allowed for the removal of the abnormally dry conditions over southern Louisiana and some improvements in southern Mississippi, where both moderate drought and abnormally dry conditions were improved.

In Kansas, light precipitation was measured in the Northeast. Most other areas were dry for the week. Colder-than-normal temperatures dominated the region with areas of southeast Kansas 20-25 degrees below normal for the week. With the dry conditions, moderate drought levels were expanded over southern Kansas along with additional abnormally dry conditions being shown.

Kansas Drought Monitor shows Moderate Drought has increased from 21.55 percent last week to 24.82. Texas Drought ratings increased slightly from 42.52 percent a week ago to 49.01 percent.



Click here for the Kansas Drought Monitor Page and Click here for the Texas Drought Monitor Page.

Click here for the US Drought Monitor details for this week.

The Oklahoma Wheat Commission promotes greater use of wheat in domestic and international markets through research, market development and public education.

Our Commissioners develop policy and programs, direct the funding, represent producer interests and, of course, promote Oklahoma wheat!

Learn more about the Oklahoma Wheat Commission by clicking here for their website.

Oklahoma agricultural producers are facing a period of uncertainty amidst USDA turnover and upcoming program deadlines. Dr. Amy Hagerman of Oklahoma State University (OSU) recently visited with Farm Director KC Sheperd and shared valuable insights, emphasizing the need for patience, meticulous record-keeping, and proactive engagement with USDA offices.

“This administration came in with a stated intention of decreasing the footprint of the federal government and then also decreasing spending in the federal government,” Dr. Hagerman explained. This has led to staff reductions at USDA, creating potential bottlenecks in program delivery. “As we begin to lose USDA employees, this is going to create some openings and some holes across the state that are going to make it harder to get programs out the door.”

With potential staffing shortages, Dr. Hagerman advised producers to “be patient with these offices that may find themselves with relatively short notice being pretty short-staffed.”

She recommended scheduling appointments well in advance and keeping meticulous records. “Do the best you can to keep track of your records,” Dr. Hagerman stressed. Producers should be aware of deadlines and keep detailed documentation of losses.

NCBA’s Mary-Thomas Hart Discusses the Outlook of WOTUS in Trump 2.0

Senior Farm and Ranch Broadcaster, Ron Hays, is continuing his conversation with the National Cattlemen’s Beef Association Chief Counsel Mary-Thomas Hart about WOTUS or “Waters of the United States.” WOTUS is a term used in the Clean Water Act (CWA) to define which bodies of water are subject to federal regulation. To listen to part one of the discussion where they were talking about how recent Supreme Court decisions may impact the new Trump Administration, click here.

Hart responded positively when she said, “I hope we are seeing the light at the end of the tunnel. As far as rulemakings go, I think we are in a good place. Now, the Biden Administration and the Biden EPA reacted, kind of, out of spite after the Sackett decision. They implemented the rule that they were required to implement but then sent out some internal guidance to staff across the country, instructing them to take a pretty aggressive approach to implementing WOTUS. Staff across the country did that.”

Hart hopes that the new Trump administration will rein in those aggressive guidance initiatives to ensure the behavior of EPA staff across the country aligns with the true intent of the Sackett v. EPA decision.

Additionally, Hart expects the EPA to adjust its response on other fronts concerning things like herbicides, pesticides, and rodenticides.

We continue to share comments from the Director of the Oklahoma Ag Leadership Program Edmond Bonjour (and also from Rose Bonjour) as Class XXI travels across parts of Kenya for their International Capstone study experience. This story includes stops made on Thursday, February 27, 2025.

Thursday, the OALP began the day with a visit to Dudutech, a Bioline Agrosciences group company – the largest biological production facility in sub-Saharan Africa. (Rose points out that Dudu means insects in Zahili.) They are leaders in Integrated Pest Management (IPM) with a wealth of experience in designing and delivering about 50 control products of which 17 are biological control agents.

Integrated Pest Management (IPM) is quite complex. Education is a huge component of what they do. With the need to feed 10 billion people by 2050, solutions must to be created. Climate change is impacting production, conventional ag may add to the greenhouse effect, and soil degradation is happening. It’s time for a paradigm shift.



Physical (trapping), biological (natural predators), cultural (crop rotation), companion crops and chemicals are all ways to control pests. Steps to successful IPM includes 1) identifying pest, 2) understanding the pest, 3) monitor crops (which is the backbone of IPM), 4) make a decision – when to act, 5) take action, 6) assess results.

This week on SUNUP, OSU Agriculture Economist Dr. John Michael Riley discusses the highs and lows of current grain and cotton markets.

In the time since the grain and cotton markets were last discussed, a new WASDE report was published, and although it held no big surprises, an inevitable bounce in the marketplace was still felt.

“That is why I have always said and continue to say, ‘If you can stay out of making any pricing decisions when that report is in the midst of being released, try to do your best to do that.’”

According to Riley, the market expects the recent extremely cold temperatures to impact wheat yields. “We started getting that cold weather about the time that the WASDE report was released, but since then, the market really rallied for a couple of days. A lot of that had to do with the winter freeze, but we are also getting a lot of positive news about exports.”

Wheat exports are on pace with normal but above expectations.

An alternative way of measuring falling numbers that would benefit U.S. wheat farmers and customers around the world who rely on U.S. crop quality earned positive reviews during product testing late last year at the Wheat Marketing Center (WMC), Portland, Oregon.

Meanwhile, there is renewed hope for a “rapid” system that will allow farmers to test falling numbers in the field as they harvest their wheat.

In January, during the U.S. Wheat Associates (USW) Winter Board of Directors meeting, WMC Technical Director Dr. Jayne Bock provided an update on her team’s participation in the project. Bock credited Washington State University (WSU) for developing the system, which is described as “faster and more accurate” than the decades-old falling number test currently being used.

U.S. wheat farmers also played a role in the product testing – WMC used samples of soft white (SW), hard red winter (HRW), hard red spring (HRS) and hard white (HW) wheat.

Amber Hauvermale, a research assistant professor in Washington State University’s (WSU) Department of Crop and Soil Sciences, led a team that was behind the project.