Yes. Drought. As I've been posting for months, we've gotten mist but not rain, not measurable rain that reaches into the root zone. All over town trees have severe die-back. Everything needs WATER.

Get a water meter and stick it into the ground. Bone dry.

For those interested: The mystery is solved.
I met with an arborist today to have some trimming done on the oaks and learned the cause of the tips dying is due to ..........squirrels! It's happening everywhere.

They're chewing the outer branches to get to the cambium layer, which leads to death of the branch tip. We were able to reach several lower limbs that were dying back and everyone of them had been chewed on.

I wonder if they're doing it because of food shortage, or just boredom??