Drought

When we moved to Virginia 23 years ago, we were amazed at how lush it was. Of course, that could've been due simply to having grown up in the west where it's amazingly dry and airy, so by comparison, just about anywhere is going to seem wetter.  But over the years, it's gotten drier - until it seems like we're always under some kind of drought condition now.

Take a look at February vs April 2011 via Drought Monitor, Univ of Nebraska:

They caution against reading these things "too literally", but this doesn't look like a happy trend, especially for the South Central states.