lightning rods

[fishdrivel]

I'm under the impression that very dry ground is a poor conductor and therefore a poor electrical ground (thus why electric fences don't work well when the ground gets really dry unless you're expecting the fence to zap between the hot wire and part of the fence instead of the ground).

My ground here is bone dry two feet down in the summer, but when you pound a rod down deeper you start getting a decent year-round ground.

I guess the ground ring or ground-in-a-trench works because there's just so much more ground contact that it makes up for the higher resistivity of the potentially drier soil?

Interesting related article: https://www.ecmweb.com/content/article/20892049/achieving-an-acceptable-ground-in-poor-soil

Correct. In military enviroment, all of our grounds had to be tested and certified yearly.
Even when you pound a 10' ground rod in they do not always pass.
Now if you are not grounding a $125 million F-35 than you might not have to worry but if you are depending on lightning protection I might rather have ground rods and test their function.