Today’s column (gift link) explores a somewhat rare phenomenon in northern Minnesota, something called a storage drought.
We’ve all seen droughts before. No rain. Grass dries out and turns brown. Farmers lament a less productive harvest. We’re experiencing some of that this year, but something deeper is going on. Specifically, we’re losing our groundwater because of several years of rainwater deficits. Climatologists call this a “storage drought.”
I first noticed something was up when the turtle pond along my morning walk started to disappear. This pond sometimes behaves like a vernal pool. That means it fills up in with melted snow and rainwater in the spring and becomes more shallow as summer wears on. But it doesn’t typically dry out completely. It has almost done so this year. The adjacent Prairie River hasn’t been this low in my 21 years of living here. Lakes throughout north central Minnesota are also very low.
It’s the groundwater, or lack of it.
This could have big implications going forward. Even if we get a good rain, we’ll need a few years of good rain to get back to what we used to call normal. Even if this happens, our trend toward higher temperatures will make it harder to keep that water in the ground. Eventually, we’ll be talking about depleted wells. That means we need to get serious about water conservation now.
Read “Dry weather is draining our water, even in Lakes Country,” in the Monday, Aug. 24, 2026 edition of the Minnesota Star Tribune.
Aaron J. Brown is a columnist and member of the editorial board for the Minnesota Star Tribune. His new book about Hibbing Mayor Victor Power and his momentous fight against the world’s largest corporation will be out soon.
