Farmers pray for umbrella weather

– High plains rancher Bill Lassey recently made a pilgrimage that nature hadn't allowed him to repeat for 67 years: He walked across the Yellowstone River and barely got wet.

Normally, fording the storied river's girth as it flows here through the eastern part of North Dakota would require a boat, but Mr. Lassey needed only a pair of worn galoshes.

"I never thought I'd see the Yellowstone so low again in my lifetime," says the rancher, recalling his childhood in the 1930s Dust Bowl era.

The languid condition of the Yellowstone – the longest free-flowing river in the US – is symbolic of a worsening dry spell that, for large swathes of the country, is shaping up to be the worst drought of the past 100 years.

From Georgia to Maine, officials are issuing water conservation measures as blue skies across the East Coast continue to show little sign of impending snowfall or rain. It's not the only region declared to be in a state of "severe" or "extreme" drought. In the croplands of Oklahoma, Kansas, and Texas, wheat-crop ratings are being graded as "very poor" by state agriculture boards due to drought-stress conditions. Other regions are feeling the effects too.

• New Jersey, which has just experienced the driest February on record, has instituted drought restrictions such as banning car washing and forbidding restaurants to serve water to customers unless it is requested.

• Boat launch ramps at Lake Marburg in Codorous State Park, Harrisburg, Pa., have been closed as the water levels across the state continue to sink as if someone had pulled a bath plug.

• The Los Angeles Times reports that drought conditions in the wild are encouraging coyotes to venture into L.A.'s hillside neighborhoods.

Few areas of the country, however, are struggling as much as the "inner West." Five consecutive years of drought have been nearly invisible to outsiders, yet devastating to locals, who see no relief in sight.

"This is turning out to be a staggering event for a lot of rural people and communities," says Jess Aber, who sits on a special drought task force created by Montana's governor. "Before the drought, there were many towns sliding downward because of the challenging economics of agriculture, but now they're being pushed over a precipice."

Not long ago, a group of county commissioners from Montana's "Golden Triangle" wheat-growing belt, which stretches across north central Montana, warned that ripple effects could be far- reaching. Last year, the Montana Agricultural Statistics Service reported that there were 1,000 fewer farms in the state than the year before.

Small-town economies that anchored the state's $1 billion agriculture industry are also drying up. Lower crop yields mean farmers can't pay off bank debt and, in turn, are unable to secure loans for necessary supplies, machinery, and pick-up trucks. "Auto dealerships and implement stores, which were the anchors of these communities, are going under," Aber says.

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