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M/CLEAR Temp: 44 °F Wind: NW at 4 mph Tuesday, April 1, 2003 SECTIONS Home Page Local News Sports Business Obituaries Life Opinion - Politics AP News Weather Classified Archives Site Map EXTRA HomeLife Magazine W3 Magazine Jobs @ Mail Tribune Tempo A & E Oregon CarZone Wellness Connection Real Estate Newspaper in Education Prime Times Outdoor Journal Personals Movie Times TV Times E The People CLASSIFIEDS Find a Car Find a Home Find a Job Find Everything E SOUTHERN OREGON Automotive Communities Entertainment Publications Recreation Calendar ABOUT US FAQ What's New Advertise Home Delivery Classified Ad Contact Us Media Kit Email Story to a Friend April 1, 2003 Lack of low-elevation snow could hurt later The region’s low snowpack below 6,000 feet might mean irrigation shortages this spring and summer By PAUL FATTIG Mail Tribune When Steve Johnson took his annual end-of-March snow survey Sunday, the Forest Service snow surveyor got a mixed message from Mother Nature. "There’s a lot of snow above 6,000 feet, but below that we’re way below normal," he reported. "That’s unusual." The largely nonexistent snowpack below 6,000 feet may be worrisome come late spring and summer since the winter snow blanket feeds streams and reservoirs that provide water for low-elevation irrigators and municipalities. "With the amount of snow we have on the ground now, it means we could have water shortages this summer," warned hydrologist Stan Fox, state snow surveyor for the federal Natural Resources Conservation Service, which keeps statewide statistics. Remote snow telemetry sites high in the mountains indicate the snowpack in mountains ringing the Rogue and Umpqua basins is 59 percent of normal, Fox reported Monday. "Last year, it was 124 percent of average at the end of March," he said. "This water year started out good with about 140 percent of average (basin snowpack) at the end of December. But a lot of that has melted off." Statewide, the snowpack average is about 58 percent of normal, about 10 percent higher than a month ago, he said. The good news is that precipitation is about 126 percent of average in the Rogue-Umpqua basins and 165 percent of average in the Klamath Basin, he said. But the snowpack still remains well below normal because of the above-average temperatures, he said. Johnson, who has been keeping the snowpack tally for the Ashland Ranger District for some two decades, found no snow at the Siskiyou Summit survey site at 4,000 feet. That has been the case for the end-of-March measurement about 20 times since the agency began measuring snow there in the 1940s, he said. Yet the snow was 56 inches deep with a water content of 23 inches at the Ski Bowl Road site at 6,000 feet. That’s about 90 percent of normal for this time of year, Johnson said. At the Mount Ashland Switchback site at 6,500 feet, there was 79 inches of snow containing 33 inches of water, reflecting a normal for the end of March, he said. The Caliban site at the same elevation contained 77 inches of snow with 32 inches of water content. Those figures are about 107 percent of normal, Johnson reported. "It’s almost identical for the two upper elevation sites at this time last year," Johnson said. "But when you drop down below that 6,000 foot level, it’s way below normal." Since the mountain snowpack measurements began Oct. 1, total precipitation in the mountains in the Rogue-Umpqua Basin has been about 88 percent of normal. Reach reporter Paul Fattig at 776-4496 or e-mail him at [email protected] Printer Friendly Version Email Story to a Friend Subscribe Archive: Click to Search Mail Tribune Home Local News | Sports | Business | Obituaries | Life Opinion - Politics | AP News | Archives | Site Map E Southern Oregon | Classified Copyright © 1997-2003 Mail Tribune. All rights reserved. Privacy Policy Website Feedback A D V E R T I S E R S