Allen (Al) Dutcher

Allen (Al) Dutcher

  • Contact Information
  • My Story
  • Publications
  • Background
  • Interests
  • Grants

Contact Information

TitleExtension Agricultural Climatologist
Faculty RankAssociate Geoscientist
Address153d North Hardin Hall
3310 Holdrege Street
Lincoln NE
68583–0931
Phone
  • office: 402-472-5206
  • fax: 402-472-2946
E-mailadutcher1@unl.edu
VitaeDownload file

 

Contact Preference

Phone (402)-472-5206

Office Hours

MTWRF 7:00 am - 4:00 pm

My Story

Hi, I'm Al Dutcher, and I'm a Extension Agricultural Climatologist with the Nebraska State Climate Office (NSCO) and the School of Natural Resources.

My main research and service interests have to do with crop-climate relationships, soil-moisture monitoring, drought monitoring, climate forecasting, precipitation distributions, and thermal tracking of crop and insect development.

These issues have real-world impacts as follows: temperature sensor changes can affect load function equations used by utilities for billing customers; precipitation distribution (on the landscape) will affect crop stress and yield functions; accurate soil moisture assessment at the beginning of the cropping season can be used to determine the degree of risk for potential drought damage; proper weather station siting will give a more accurate representation of weather conditions; thermal tracking of crop and insect development will allow for more accurate evapotranspiration forecasts and timely insecticide applications.

In the past, I've worked on similar kinds of projects: soil moisture modeling, evapotranspiration modeling, weather broadcasting, drought monitoring, surface weather observation siting, impacts of sensor changes on temperature functions, and impacts of precipitation distributions on crop yields.

I've been the state climatologist since 1991, first as a staff person, and since 2006 as faculty. From 1989 to 1991, I was an operations climatologist with the UNL-based High Plains Regional Climate Center.

Selected Publications

Shulski, M., Cooper, S., Roebke, G., Dutcher, A. (2018). The Nebraska Mesonet: : Technical overview of an automated state weather network. Journal of Atmospheric and Oceanic Technology.
Hunt, E.D., K.G. Hubbard, D.A. Wilhite, T.J. Arkebauer, and A.L. Dutcher. 2008. The development and evaluation of a soil moisture index. Int. J. Climatol. Wiley InterScience. DOI: 10.1002/joc.1749.Online
Meyer, S.J., Dutcher, A.L. 1998. Soil Temperatures and Spring Planting Dates. [Brochure]. Lincoln, NE. University of Nebraska-Lincoln Extension, Institute of Agriculture and Natural Resources.Online
Meyer, S.J., Dutcher, A.L. 1997. Autumn Freeze Probabilities. [Brochure]. Lincoln, NE. University of Nebraska-Lincoln Extension, Institute of Agriculture and Natural Resources.Online
Meyer, S.J., Dutcher, A.L. 1996. Spring Freeze Probabilities. [Brochure]. Lincoln, NE. University of Nebraska-Lincoln Extension, Institute of Agriculture and Natural Resources.Online

Background

Education

DegreeMajorInstitutionYear Awarded
Master of ScienceAgricultural MeteorologyIowa State University1985
Bachelor of ScienceMeteorologyIowa State University1983

 

Affiliations

 

Awards

TitleAwarded byYear Awarded
Excellence in Extension Team Award for "Hail Know"Nebraska Extension2018

 

Websites

 

SNR Program Areas

  • Applied Climate and Spatial Science

Areas of Interest/Expertise

  • Climate services
  • Climate Data Requests
  • Climate Trends
  • Weather Forecasting
  • Drought Monitoring
  • Crop Yield - Climate relationships
  • Irrigation Scheduling
  • Climate - Pheonological Development
  • Soil Moisture Monitoring

Grants

Currently this page only displays grants that were awarded on 1/1/ 2009 to the present. If a grant was awarded prior to 1/1/ 2009 and is still active, it will not be displayed on this page.

Grant TitleNebraska Water Leaders Academy (Additional Funding)
Starting Date01/20/2020

Investigator(s)

Ending Date06/30/2020
Funding Level$40,263.00
Funding AgencyNebraska State Irrigation Association / Nebraska Environmental Trust