Crossword clues for drought
drought
- Dust Bowl phenomenon
- A temporary shortage of rainfall
- A prolonged shortage
- Extended shortage
- Time to irrigate
- Very dry period
- Very dry spell
- Medic is compelled into humanitarian crisis
- Endlessly valiant, securing water at last in this?
- Lack of water and bread keeps king tense
- Arduous time following drunkard's last dry spell
- Period with little rain
Longman Dictionary of Contemporary English
The Collaborative International Dictionary
Drought \Drought\ (drout), n. [OE. droght, drougth, dru[yogh][eth], AS. druga[eth], from drugian to dry. See Dry, and cf. Drouth, which shows the original final sound.]
-
Dryness; want of rain or of water; especially, such dryness of the weather as affects the earth, and prevents the growth of plants; aridity.
The drought of March hath pierced to the root.
--Chaucer.In a drought the thirsty creatures cry.
--Dryden. Thirst; want of drink.
--Johnson.-
Scarcity; lack.
A drought of Christian writers caused a dearth of all history.
--Fuller.
Douglas Harper's Etymology Dictionary
Old English drugað, drugoð "drought, dryness, desert," from Proto-Germanic *drugothaz, from Germanic root *dreug- "dry" (cf high/height) with *-itho, Germanic suffix for forming abstract nouns (see -th (2)). Drouth was a Middle English variant continued in Scottish and northern English dialect and in poetry.
Wiktionary
n. A period of below average rainfall, longer and more severe than a dry spell.
WordNet
n. a temporary shortage of rainfall
a prolonged shortage
Wikipedia
A drought is a period of below-average precipitation in a given region, resulting in prolonged shortages in its water supply, whether atmospheric, surface water or ground water. A drought can last for months or years, or may be declared after as few as 15 days. It can have a substantial impact on the ecosystem and agriculture of the affected region and harm to the local economy. Annual dry seasons in the tropics significantly increase the chances of a drought developing and subsequent bush fires. Periods of heat can significantly worsen drought conditions by hastening evaporation of water vapour.
Many plant species, such as those in the family Cactaceae (or cacti), have adaptations like reduced leaf area and waxy cuticles to enhance their ability to tolerate drought. Some others survive dry periods as buried seeds. Semi-permanent drought produces arid biomes such as deserts and grasslands. Prolonged droughts have caused mass migrations and humanitarian crises. Most arid ecosystems have inherently low productivity. The most prolonged drought ever in the world in recorded history occurred in the Atacama Desert in Chile (400 Years).
In sports, a drought refers to instances in which an individual or team has gone through a lengthy period of time without accomplishing some goal. For a team, this usually refers to an extended period of time without making the playoffs or winning a championship. Droughts occur for a variety of reasons, from chronic mismanagement to bad luck. Some droughts are also popularly attributed to a curse.
A drought is an extended period of months or years when a region notes a deficiency in its water supply.
Drought may also refer to:
- Drought (sport), an instance in which a team has gone a lengthy period of time without accomplishing some goal
- Drought (EP), an EP by Deathspell Omega
Drought is an EP by Deathspell Omega. It is the band's first release of new material since their 2010 album Paracletus. It is the final release included in the band's 2012 vinyl box set incorporating the trilogy and related works, suggesting that the band regards it as thematically connected.
Usage examples of "drought".
Winding picturesquely among the trees, well-worn trails led to the Goat-House, to the western slope where Williams lived, to the Aute Valley where the principal gardens of the cloth-plant had been laid out, to the yam and sweet-potato patches and plantain walks, to the rock cisterns Christian had insisted on building in case of drought, to the Rope, and to the saw pit, still used occasionally when someone was in need of plank.
One is away on the far Barcoo Watching his cattle the long year through, Watching them starve in the droughts and die.
Through drought and war, through the ripping apart of one way of life and the making of another, Beaux Reves stood.
The grasslands around us were turning yellow and brown from heat and drought, but Daphnia was watered by canals.
Drought, fire, dieback, desert spreading and spreading, while the heat mounts.
There has been another full-scale dieback in North Africa due to drought and lack of food reserves.
The droughts, hot winds and grasshoppers took them, as witness the Entryman and his wife who homesteaded this identical land in 1893 .
Old Labbers had later explained that forty years earlier a severe drought had struck the nations of the southeast.
Sometimes adaptations to protect the plant during seasons of drought, such as the rolling up of the thallus in many xerophytic Marchantiales, can be recognized, but more often a prolonged dry season is survived in some resting state.
Mount Mlanje when the rest of the range baked in the long African droughts.
The fauns or nymphs protected their trees, bringing them water in times of drought and harassing woodsmen who wanted to chop the trees down.
In a typical forest, what probably happens is that the preexisting ecosystem is hammered by few years of drought, says Steve Jackson, a paleoclimate researcher from the University of Wyoming.
Not a tree or shrub was to be seen, everything was rioting in summer heat and drought, while behind lay the last grand canyon of the mountains, dark with pines and cool with snow.
Shrunken by summer drought, it was hardly more than a chain of pools the biggest barely four feet deepdivided by narrow bars of gravel, through and over which the water trickled in glistening films.
Just as the glaciers and droughts of a pretechnical world must affect a people, so must we accept these long-term changes.