Sheridan County, Kansas · Hoxie
Water spreading, a burst pipe, sewage, mold or smoke? Call to be connected with a restoration company that serves Hoxie and Selden. Start the steps below while you wait.
Answered 24/7 by a participating local provider. We're a referral service and don't do the work ourselves. How it works
Start here
Pick the closest match. These steps limit the damage and protect your insurance claim. Skip anything that isn't safe.
With 40% of homes built before 1960 and about 56 hard-freeze nights a year, frozen and split pipes are a leading winter risk in the county.
Heavy rain days of an inch or more come about 3.2 times a year here, most often in May. A sump pump that hasn't run since last season is a common weak point.
Backups often follow heavy rain, which Sheridan County gets about 3.2 days a year, when storm water overloads sewer mains and pushes up through the lowest drain in the house.
In Sheridan County, 2.4 inches fell on the wettest day of the 2015–2024 record. Storms like that, and ice dams in snowy winters, cause most roof leaks.
28% of occupied homes in Sheridan County heat mainly with wood or propane, above the Kansas county median of 16.9%.
With 28 muggy nights a year, mold in Sheridan County can appear within days of a leak. Dry first, then clean.
Local risk profile
About 2,426 people live in Sheridan County, 896 square miles in northwest Kansas, in roughly 1,155 homes. Besides Hoxie, the county seat, the biggest community is Selden. Half the homes here were built before 1969, half after.
41/100 Water Damage Risk Index: Moderate Sheridan County ranks 89 of 105 Kansas counties. See the statewide ranking and method.The three factors where Sheridan County ranks highest compared with other Kansas counties.
Sheridan County gets more hard-freeze nights than most of Kansas. From 2015–2024 it averaged 56 nights a year at 20°F or colder, the range where pipes in exterior walls, crawl spaces and unheated garages freeze, and 140 nights at or below 32°F. That ranks 11th of 105 counties.
Cold snaps are the real risk. The worst in the record lasted 13 days below freezing (ending February 2021), and the low bottomed out near -22°F on February 15, 2021.
Expect the hardest freezes in January, inside a season that runs November to March. That's when an outdoor spigot left connected to a hose, or a pipe in a crawl space, is most likely to split.
Freezing nights typically start around Oct 17 and end around Apr 19.
Sheridan gets fewer downpours than most Kansas counties, but they still fill basements. Of roughly 20.6 inches of yearly precipitation, the damage comes from the 3.2 days a year with an inch or more, ranked 94th of 105. May, June and August see the most. The single wettest day in the record: 2.4 inches, August 11, 2019. The worst three-day stretch dropped 3.82 inches, ending August 13, 2019, the kind of soaking that overwhelms sump pumps and storm sewers.
The temperature crosses 32°F in both directions on roughly 120 days a year. Each cycle melts and refreezes water at roof edges and in foundation cracks, which is how ice dams and basement seepage get started.
Housing
74% of homes in Sheridan County predate 1980, close to the Kansas county median of 73.7%, which ranks 54th of Kansas's 105 counties.
Housing age is mixed: 40% of homes are pre-1960 and 10% are 2000 or newer. Ask any plumber which era your house is from and you'll know which failures to watch for.
Beyond water
Summer nights that don't drop below 65°F, a good marker of humid air, come about 28 times a year here, below the Kansas county median of 59. Keep indoor humidity under 60%, as the EPA advises, and dry any leak within 24 to 48 hours; in a humid month a wet basement left alone won't dry by itself.
Mold remediation: what to expectHeating fuel matters for fire risk. In Sheridan County it's 57% utility gas, 15% electric, 27% propane and under 1% wood. Propane heat is more common here than the state median. Have chimneys swept and fuel-burning appliances serviced each fall, and keep three feet clear around stoves and space heaters.
Fire and smoke cleanup: first stepsCoverage
Calls connect to restoration companies that work across Sheridan County. The largest communities by population:
Population from ACS 2020-2024 5-year estimates. Townships and unincorporated areas are covered too.
Nearby
Decatur, Norton and Thomas get more pipe-freeze nights than Sheridan. Decatur County has the oldest housing nearby, with 86% of homes built before 1980.
By the numbers
| Factor | Sheridan | Kansas median | Rank |
|---|---|---|---|
| Homes built before 1960 | 40% | 48% | 71 of 105 |
| Homes built before 1980 | 74% | 74% | 54 of 105 |
| Homes built 2000 or later | 10% | 11% | 59 of 105 |
| Manufactured or mobile homes | 5.5% | 5.6% | 54 of 105 |
| Vacant homes | 15% | 15% | 56 of 105 |
| Wood or propane heat | 28% | 17% | 20 of 105 |
| Nights at 20°F or colder | 56/yr | 39/yr | 11 of 105 |
| Days with 1 inch+ of rain | 3.2/yr | 6.8/yr | 94 of 105 |
| Freeze-thaw days | 120/yr | 97/yr | 15 of 105 |
| Muggy nights (65°F+) | 28/yr | 59/yr | 93 of 105 |
Rank 1 is the highest value. Bars run from the lowest to the highest Kansas county; the tick marks the median; orange means higher water damage risk than the median, green means lower.
Questions
Peak risk months in Sheridan County: freezing from November to March, heavy rain in May, June and August.
Sources: U.S. Census Bureau, ACS 2024 5-year estimates (2020-2024); weather from NOAA nClimGrid-Daily county averages (EpiNOAA), 2015–2024, averaged across the county; county boundaries from Census TIGER. Reviewed 2026-10-21. Methodology