I thought this was called summer?

We’ve seen the comments. On social media. On news articles. A few via email. We hear you.

When we talk about drought, there are thoughts. Questions. Opinions.

Some of those… helpful. Others… mmmm.

Among the most frequently repeated comments this year were variations of “summer is supposed to be dry.” We also got a few “but it rains nine months a year.” And one or two “this summer has been great.”

Now, we get it – some of this is meant as snark. We’re not trying to start a flame war! Heck, there’s a burn ban on.

But understanding why this summer is very much not normal is a critical question to answer – both for us at Ecology and for everyone in our state.

So let’s tackle that question: If every summer is hot and dry, how much does it matter that this summer is a little bit hotter and a little bit drier?

“Summer is supposed to be dry - that’s why it’s called summer!”

Yes, summer typically is drier than the rest of the year. However…

Ecology is the state agency charged with issuing formal drought declarations. It’s a move that opens up funding and tools to help deal with the impacts of drought in Washington. So, for us, what’s important is evaluating how dry it is compared to normal.

“Normal” itself is a little tricky. For our purposes, “normal” is the average of the last 30 years.

Why is that tricky? Well, our summers have been getting hotter and drier for a while now. That means that the new normal we’re comparing today’s conditions to is both hotter and drier than the normal of yesteryear.

But whatever you compare it to, summer 2025 is indeed very, very dry.

Statewide, June was the third-driest since 1895. Third driest in the past 130 years. That’s not just dry; that’s historically dry. Some eastern Washington counties went the entire month with no measurable rain.

Now, you might wonder, is no (or nearly no) rain normal for those areas? Definitely not.

Franklin, Grant, Adams, Spokane, Garfield, Walla Walla and Whitman counties all experienced their driest Junes on record.

The “wettest” county east of the Cascades in June was Pend Oreille, which checked in with less than an inch of rain - a whopping 0.8 inches. Which, for the record, was still Pend Oreille’s fourth-driest June on record.

Was June an outlier? It’s not looking that way. While at the time of typing this blog, July is not quite finished, it’s also shaping up to be pretty dry.

And long-term forecasts predict that warmer and drier than normal conditions will likely persist through August. Over at NOAA, the Climate Prediction Center’s one-month outlook for August 2025 indicates elevated chances of above-normal temperatures and below-normal precipitation. There is a 60-70% chance of above-normal temperatures across eastern Washington.

“But it rains nine months a year”

We get this one a lot. And there’s a lot to unpack here. Sort of like that umbrella that’s gathering dust in your closet this time of year.

On the west side of the state, nine months of precipitation is generally correct. However, any Seattle tour guide will tell you, it doesn’t rain a lot in Washington. It rains frequently.

Typical annual rainfall in western Washington is about 66 inches, and the typical year checks in with 168 days of measurable precipitation in a year. Averaged over the course of a year, that’s a little less than 0.4 inches per day.

Ironically, one of the big challenges facing both western and eastern Washington is too much rain.

That’s because up in the mountains, all that precipitation is supposed to fall as snow in the winter. Rain runs off into the sea. Snow builds up over months, then takes months more to gradually melt off, keeping streams high and replenishing aquifers. The snowpack is a frozen reservoir. If we don’t get the snow, we don’t get the extra reservoir.

Many of Washington’s watersheds depend more on snowmelt than rain. We don’t store a lot of our water in reservoirs – certainly not enough to replace what comes from snowpack. So, even in an especially wet winter, if the precipitation comes down as rain instead of snow - or if the spring snowmelt gets rolling too early, we’ll have plenty of water when we don’t need it. And not nearly enough when we do.

That’s a pattern we’ve seen with increasing – and worrying – frequency in recent decades.

It’s what we saw this spring, with many watersheds melting off weeks or even a month early. We went from a drought emergency for just three counties near Yakima in April – places we could see trouble coming – to 12 counties covering much of the Puget Sound region and north central Washington. A late shot of rain or a little slower snowmelt and those areas might have avoided drought this year.

“This summer has been great – I love the sun and heat”

Once again, we get it. Blue skies and hot sun make summer, summer. But… it’s also what makes drought, drought.

Finally, we shouldn’t have to say it, but we have to say it: We know most people in Washington live on the west side of the mountains, and many of us west-siders treasure taking as long a break as possible from the gray and the gloom of winter. But there’s a lot more to the state than just western Washington.

Climate, topography, and the water needs of people and wildlife vary greatly between regions.

Just because it’s wet in one corner of the state doesn’t mean people aren’t struggling on the other side of the mountains, or even a little further downstream.  

What might feel like a great summer to you could have lasting impacts on agriculture, wildlife, and communities that get hit with triple-digit temperatures and wildfire smoke.

So, there you have it.

Yes, it’s dry. It’s hot. And while “hot” and “dry” are things you normally associate with summer, the conditions we’re seeing this year are not normal... or even what passes for the new normal these days.