Drought and drouth, nouns derived from the adjective dry plus a suffix, are spellings that represent two phonetic developments of the same Old English word, and are pronounced [drout] and [drouth] respectively. The latter pronunciation, therefore, is not a mispronunciation of drought.

In a dry manner.

The word ‘drought’ once had three common variant spellings. The word is ultimately from the Old English word for “dry” (dryge); the adjective turned into a verb (drugian, “to make dry”), and then that verb was adapted into a noun (drugath or drugoth, “a dry place”).

drought /draʊt/ n. Meteorology a long period of dry weather:[countable]The drought lasted for months. an extended shortage of water:[uncountable]Drought had struck East Africa.

(intransitive) To lose moisture. (transitive) To remove moisture from. (obsolete, intransitive) To be thirsty.

A drought is a period of time when an area or region experiences below-normal precipitation. The lack of adequate precipitation, either rain or snow, can cause reduced soil moisture or groundwater, diminished stream flow, crop damage, and a general water shortage. A drought may last for weeks, months, or even years.

When rainfall is less than normal for a period of weeks to years, streamflows decline, water levels in lakes and reservoirs fall, and the depth to water in wells increases. If dry weather persists and water-supply problems develop, the dry period can become a drought.

When the PHDI reaches a value equal to or greater than −0.5, drought ends. And, when the PHDI reaches a value greater than or equal to −2.0, a severe or extreme drought ameliorates.

Here are the 5 natural and human causes of drought:

• 1) Land and water temperatures cause drought.
• 2) Air circulation and weather patterns also cause drought.
• 3) Soil moisture levels also contribute to drought.
• 4) Drought can also be a supply and demand of water issue.

As a result, the climatological community has defined four types of drought: 1) meteorological drought, 2) hydrological drought, 3) agricultural drought, and 4) socioeconomic drought. Meteorological drought happens when dry weather patterns dominate an area.

Choose a water-efficient irrigation system such as drip irrigation for your trees, shrubs, and flowers. Turn irrigation down in fall and off in winter. Water manually in winter only if needed. Put a layer of mulch around trees and plants to reduce evaporation and keep the soil cool.

Just as climate change has worsened many extreme weather events, it has also impacted droughts. The excess heat now trapped in the climate system draws out more moisture from soils, thereby worsening drought conditions.

Roughly 2.5 billion people – 30 percent of the world’s population – live in the dry areas, which cover more than 40 percent of the world’s land surface.

Examples of drought impacts on society include anxiety or depression about economic losses, conflicts when there is not enough water, reduced incomes, fewer recreational activities, higher incidents of heat stroke, and even loss of human life. Drought conditions can also provide a substantial increase in wildfire risk.

Repeated droughts around the world are destroying enough farm produce to feed 81 million people for a year and are four times more costly for economies than floods, the World Bank found in a new study. …

A flood is generally more destructive than a drought by it’s nature. A flood can wreak millions of dollars of damage in a matter of minutes or hours, not to mention the threat to human and animal lives. A drought, on the other hand, can permanently devastate an agricultural area if they are persistent.

The main difference between Drought and Flood is that the Drought is a extended period when a region notes a deficiency in its water supply and Flood is a overflow of water that submerges land. A drought can last for months or years, or may be declared after as few as 15 days.

Answer Expert Verified. Human beings are responsible for the drought in Maharashtra in 2016. According to the water conservationist Rajendra Singh, the drought primarily occurred because the Indian Government lacked a serious attitude regarding water security.

Forests can soak up excess rainwater, preventing run-offs and damage from flooding. By releasing water in the dry season, forests can also help provide clean water and mitigate the effects of droughts.

Droughts occur when an abnormally long dry period uses up available water resources. Floods happen when watercourses or rain swallow up land that is usually uncovered. These natural disasters are often made worse by human action. As it builds up on the surface, the water ends up causing widespread damage.

Examples of Environmental Impacts of Drought
Fish and Animals	Reduction and degradation of fish and wildlife habitat. Lack of drinking water for livestock and wildlife.
Water Sources	Lower water levels in reservoirs, lakes, and ponds. Reduced streamflow.
Land	Reduced soil quality. Increased quantity of dust.

A drought is caused by drier than normal conditions that can eventually lead to water supply problems. Really hot temperatures can make a drought worse by causing moisture to evaporate from the soil. Just because a region is hot and dry doesn’t necessarily mean it is going through a drought.

As plant growth declines, open water increases, reducing habitat quality for waterfowl and other wildlife. Fortunately, water levels in most wetlands draw down naturally at some point, and this is where drought plays a beneficial role in rejuvenating wetlands.

Inappropriate land use, such as monocultures, and unsustainable land management practices, such as deforestation, unsuitable agricultural practices and overexploitation of water resources), can cause land degradation that can be further aggravated by drought. …

Overgrazing can cause drought-like conditions even with average precipitation. Rangeland in fair condition is often more severely affected by drought than rangeland in good to excellent condition. Range condition also influences the rate of recovery in forage production after drought.

The causes of droughts are essentially natural, but climate change increases the drought severity, frequency, duration, and spatial extent. The impacts of droughts are also strongly exacerbated by anthropological activities, such as deforestation, overgrazing, soil degradation, and water mismanagement.

Although the cycles of drought and climatic disturbances can contribute to the development of desertification, it is mainly caused by overgrazing, land clearance, over-exploitation of cultivated and natural lands, and by generally using land in a way that is inappropriate to local conditions.

Overgrazing is the major cause of desertification worldwide. Other factors that cause desertification include urbanization, climate change, overuse of groundwater, deforestation, natural disasters, and tillage practices in agriculture that make soils more vulnerable to wind.

Human activities that contribute to desertification include the expansion and intensive use of agricultural lands, poor irrigation practices, deforestation, and overgrazing. These unsustainable land uses place enormous pressure on the land by altering its soil chemistry and hydrology.