Drought-weary Californians can’t expect much from the mountains too

Not much encouragement can be expected from the mountains by Drought-weary Californians. On Friday, the officials said that the there is a lack of snow that fills the Colorado River. The range of snowpack in Wyoming and Colorado valleys from where the river originates is 51-79 percent of the normal, said the supervisor of US Department of Agriculture Snow Survey, Brian Domonkos, who monitors water availability and snowfall.

Around 40 million people as well as 6,300 square miles of farmland in 7 states get water from the Colorado river and this includes California. The snow from Rocky mountains that melts into the river doesn’t flow to California or downstream users directly. Instead of that, it is held in reservoirs where enough water is released for fulfilling legal allotments to southwestern states under court rulings and a series of agreements.

There is sufficient water in the reservoirs so that downstream states and California can be provided with full shares this year as well as in the future. Water is also obtained from the Sierra Nevada range, wherein the cover of snow is the lowest in 65 years of record keeping. The snowpack in Colorado has significantly shrunk owing to scarce snowfall and warm temperatures.

Domonkos said that “To see the decline that we saw in the beginning of March, that is abnormal and to see it continue almost unabated, almost now, that’s quite abnormal.”

11 inches of snow have been brought about by the snow on Thursday as well as Friday to the foothills as well as Colorado mountains. However, much of the snow has been falling to the east of the Continental Divide and eventually it would melt to the Arkansas rivers as well as South Platte.

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