State Climatologist Justin Glisan.

The totals collected by state climatologist Justin Glison confirm what appeared to be happening in June in much of the state — it was wetter than normal.

He says we got an average 7.6 inches of precipitation compared to the normal five inches. June also averaged four degrees warmer than normal at 73 degrees.

Glison says those numbers for June are near the top of the weather records. “Preliminary we are running at the ninth warmest month and the 13th wettest month on record,” according to Glison. The numbers are averaged out from across the state, as Glison says precipitation varied greatly.

“What we’re seeing is a weird distribution of rainfall. I mean, the north and west have received between 100 and 200 percent of what they normally would receive in June,”Glison says. “While you look at the south and the southeast in particular — which is in D-2 drought still — they are running between 50 and 75 percent of what they should have year to date.”

Glison says part of the problem is the gentle two-hour rains have gone away in the last several years and we now get more sporadic rain events.”We’ve really seen that trend hit this month. With the jet stream being so far north we get these days on end and weeks on end where we have warm moist air over the state. So when you sort of boundary that move, then that will just force thunderstorms to pop up. So, that’s the kind of unusual behavior that we’re seeing in June,” he says.

Glison took over as the state climatologist in June, following the retirement of Harry Hillaker.

(By Pat Powers, KQWC, Webster City)