GRAND FORKS (AP) - A projected 41-foot crest here for the Red River this weekend would be a June flood record.

The current record is 40.11 feet, set in June 2005. Flood stage in Grand Forks is 28 feet.

Gerald Groenewold, the director of the Energy and Environmental Research Center at the University of North Dakota, said the high level of the river has more to do with landscape change over the past 10 years than precipitation.

"Over the last 10 years, there have been a significant increase of new drain ditches all over the Red River Valley," Groenewold said. "Now, there are tens of thousands of ditches that have been enhanced in size, length and depth."

A wet spring with heavy rain has contributed to the high water level, said meteorologist Patrick Ayd, of the National Weather Service office in Grand Forks.

The weather service says this year's early summer months have been among the wettest since solid records have been kept beginning in 1942.

Grand Forks has had 9.66 inches of rain so far in May and June, making this year's growing season the fifth wettest growing season on record, through June 17. The same period in 1999, 2003 and 2005 also are in the top five wettest years.

The water travels from the farm fields to drain ditches, then to small streams or tributaries and then into the Red River, Groenewold said.

"That is why we have flooding problems both in spring and summer," he said.

A 41-foot crest in Grand Forks would be slightly higher than the "moderate" flood stage of 40 feet. Some parts of a bike path along the Greenway in Grand Forks and neighboring East Grand Forks, Minn., have been closed.

Pembina County officials have declared an emergency after 1.5 inches of rain in an hour over the weekend. The weather service says the Red River at Drayton is expected to reach 36.7 feet next Tuesday night, nearly 5 feet above flood stage.

County Auditor Dorothy Robinson says that if the Red at Drayton reaches 37.7 feet, it will flood state Highway 66 in that area.

Grand Forks County extension agent Willie Huot said the wet weather increases the danger of crop disease. He said the hardest hit area of the county is to the south, around Thompson and Reynolds.

"Forecaster Mark Ewens said the region has been in a wet cycle since 1993.

"Minus last year and a couple of other summers that were relatively dry, it really has been consistently wet," Ewens said.