Image description: Victoria sitting in front of a large tree stump.
Victoria Harris
USA
June 30, 2026
Precipitation, Vapor Pressure Deficit, and Wet-Day Frequency Reconstructions of Early Summer Iowa Hydroclimate
Increasing global temperatures have caused noticeable and marked weather and hydrologic changes across the United States. The Midwest in particular has shown an overall “wetting” trend while simultaneously experiencing droughts in recent decades. How far these shifts fall outside historic internal climate variability remains an ongoing topic of research and requires long-term context. Further, these changes raise questions not just about future overall water supply and demand, but also its daily temporal changes. Here I present May-July tree-ring reconstructions for three key hydroclimate variables in the central Midwest region: precipitation, vapor pressure deficit, and wet-day frequency. Overall, my findings indicate the region has become wetter versus historic norms and the frequency of shifts between above and below average years is increasing. These changes can have vast consequences in a heavily agricultural region already prone to devastating floods, and may indicate that new water management strategies will be needed in the future.
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Long hiatus for the entire month of July 2026
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