Dry winter may bring sorry growing season

A shortfall of precipitation could render area crops as barren as some 401(k) accounts, but more people are looking to take up a hoe in their own backyards anyway this spring.

A quarter of an inch of precipitation fell at BWI Thurgood Marshall Airport last month, marking the driest February on record since 1871, the National Weather Service reported.

And our recent rainy weekend only brought another scant quarter of an inch in Annapolis, and less at BWI Airport, where only 3.61 inches of precipitation have fallen - nearly 5 inches below the normal 8.55 inches expected from January through mid-March every year.

If the...