Drought across Texas contracted sharply in June after a third straight month of above-normal rainfall, according to the Texas Water Development Board’s latest Water and Weather report.
Statewide, June was wetter and warmer than normal, the third consecutive month wetter than normal, agency hydrologist Dr. Mark Wentzel said in the report. The improvement offered relief to a state that had endured eight consecutive drier-and-warmer-than-normal months from August 2025 through March 2026.
By late June, 32 percent of the state was in drought, down 25 percentage points since late May and down 57 percentage points since the end of March, Wentzel said. Exceptional drought, the most severe category, disappeared from the state map for the first time since July 2024. Storage in Texas water supply reservoirs ended June at 77.1 percent of capacity, up one percentage point from May but still seven percentage points below normal for the time of year.
Wentzel cautioned that the gains may pause. About 15 percent of the state remained abnormally dry heading into summer, he said, and the National Weather Service is predicting drought expansion across most of Texas through the end of September.
Looking further ahead, Wentzel pointed to reason for optimism. El Nino conditions, warmer-than-normal sea surface temperatures in the eastern equatorial Pacific, are in place and expected to persist into 2027, he said, typically bringing Texas cooler, wetter falls and winters favorable to drought improvement.
The report is part of the agency’s monthly Water and Weather series, which reviews statewide temperature, precipitation and reservoir conditions.