As of Thursday, all of Maine was either in a moderate drought or abnormally dry.
One to two inches of rain is expected over the next few days, but Sarah Jamison of the National Weather Service said parts of the state are experiencing one of the driest falls on record.
"This rain event and the next one after it is not going to be enough to end this drought," Jamison said during a state drought task force meeting today. "Our deficits are just too extreme, and the groundwater conditions are definitely going to take some time to improve."
George Harris, with the Maine Forest Service, said crews have seen a spike in wildfires over the last several weeks, concentrated in the southern part of the state.
"We've been fairly busy the last month during this dryness," he said. "We were averaging, you know, 11 or 12 fires a day."
Harris said if the ground freezes up before more precipitation falls, the state could see an even more active fire season in the spring.
