There is that new/old saying that we all love to repeat: "It must be true, I saw it on the internet." 

The same can be said for what you read, see, and hear from the news media. Sometimes they are biased. At times they are lazy, sloppy, or just wrong.

In his recent weather podcast, regional weatherman Don Day of Day Weather spent nearly half his podcast debunking the claim that the western states of the United States are currently going through the worst drought since 800 A.D. 

I'll include his podcast below so you can hear and see what he said for yourself.

Farmers, Ranchers Struggle As Texas Endures Historic Drought
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In his podcast, Don Day points out that the data for this study actually only came from the Four Corners area of the West. 

Tree ring data was used to check on drought conditions for as far back as researchers could find it.

Don day points out that tree ring data is a good clue as to what the weather was doing in the past, but it is not, by a long shot, enough data to make huge claims.

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Also, the tree ring data only represents what happened in the Four Corners area.

It does not represent the rest of the West.

Data from other areas show a different story for back then, and now.

It's not just meteorologist Don Day that is speaking out against these claims from the press.

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So then you might be wondering how bad the current drought is.

Trust me when I tell you, a lot of what you have heard is way off.

Don Day points out that, as for the current drought that the west is in, we do not have hundreds of years or more of data to go on using modern equipment.

Most like 100 years or so in a few locations out in this part of the country.

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With the data that we do have we need to look at the long-term trends to better understand what is going on.

While we do go in and out of drought conditions, the long-term trends actually show that states like Wyoming have actually gotten a little bit wetter over time.

Not Dryer.

So the idea that we are plunging into a permanent desert condition caused by man-made climate change cannot be made.

We have we years and dry years. They come and go. It's part of this planet's longer-term cycles.

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In fact, what we are dealing with now is not even the worst drought in the past 100 years.

That's not to say we are not coming out of a really bad one, but it was far worse between 1976/1977.

Also, we are coming out of this latest drought right now. It's slow but it is happening just as it has happened in years past.

I've given you the basic overview in this article. To hear, in detail, what Don Day is talking about watching his podcast. I've attached the video below.

When you see shocking claims about anything, on any topic, in the news media, please remember that there is a host of reasons why the media gets stories like this wrong. You can be the judge as to why they got this wrong.

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