
By Ronica Stromberg
The University of Nebraska–Lincoln is adding 21 weather stations to the Nebraska Mesonet network this year with $1.48 million from the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, USDA Farm Service Agency and the Lower Loup and Upper Elkhorn Natural Resource Districts. Ruben Behnke, manager of the Nebraska Mesonet, said the added stations will bring the state’s total to 94 and he would like to double that to 200 in the next few years.
“To properly cover the state, you need a relatively dense network,” he said. “Otherwise, you're providing data that's not appropriate to people who are trying to put water on their crops. Even more financially important is applying for financial disaster relief through the Farm Service Agency for drought, flood, hail or other disaster.”
Farmers are the primary users of the Nebraska Mesonet, often using data from the weather stations to decide when and how much to irrigate and when to plant, spray and harvest. They can learn current conditions and fill out a form to request data at https://nemesonet.unl.edu. Besides measuring weather and climate factors like temperature, precipitation, humidity, solar radiation and wind speed, the stations have buried sensors that measure soil temperature and moisture.
Curtis Gotschall, who runs a cow-calf operation near Atkinson, Nebraska, said he uses rainfall information from the Mesonet for drought assistance. As a board member of the Upper Elkhorn Natural Resources District, he said he has seen the value of Mesonet data for farmers who irrigate and the area could use more stations.
“The weather varies a lot within the area, and I feel it might be important to have more weather stations to the west,” he said. “We don't have very many out here in this area.”
Governmental agencies such as the Army Corps of Engineers, Farm Service Agency, the USDA, the Nebraska Forest Service, Nebraska Natural Resources Districts and the Nebraska Emergency Management Agency use Nebraska Mesonet data in making decisions on the land. For example, the Nebraska Emergency Management Agency may use the data to predict flooding or drought or may use the historical data to verify landowner claims of damage from weather.
Read the rest of the story and see more pictures at https://snr.unl.edu/aboutus/what/newstory.aspx?fid=1285