This winter's snowpack
Two articles about the amount of snow out there.
From
Northwest Cable News:
Huge snow pack could impact summer recreation
This winter's snowfall is going down as one of the deepest on record.
Officially, the state has almost 50 percent more snow than in a normal season, but many places have two, three, and even ten times the normal amount of snow.
Scott Pattee works for a federal agency you may never have heard of: the Natural Resources Conservation Service.
But you have heard of one thing his agency does � it keeps tabs on the depth of the snow and, more importantly, how much water that snow will leave behind when it melts.
"It's going to be year number 2 or year number 3 pretty much overall in the record books," he said.
The snow at Stevens Pass is above normal, but not by much. At a site at 4,000 feet, the snow depth is nearly 10.5 feet deep. But south of Stevens Pass and below, it's a lot deeper than normal.
"We're seeing 10 feet of snow at sites that either would have no snow or have only a foot or two of snow this time of year," he said.
And from the Medford, OR
Mail Tribune:
Good news for summer
Mid-elevation snow levels in Southern Oregon are well above normal, with the Siskiyou Summit breaking a 56-year-old record, promising a good water year
After some 20 winters of taking precise snow measurements, Steve Johnson is an old hand at using a snow measurement tube.
But the snow ranger for the Siskiyou Mountains Ranger District in the Rogue River-Siskiyou National Forest couldn't believe the reading he took Monday morning.
"I took a couple of extra measurements to see if I read it right," he said after plumbing the snow depths at the Siskiyou Summit site, near where Interstate 5 crests the Siskiyous.
"Then, when I came back down from higher on the mountain, I took two more measurements," he said. "They all came out the same."
The snow-water content at the summit was an astounding 559 percent of normal at 17.9 inches, which broke a 56-year-old record of 17.4 inches for the end of March set in 1952.
Records have been kept of the snow survey site at 4,600-feet elevation since 1935. The average water content is 3.2 inches.
Good news for farmers and river rafters (when it finally starts melting)... Bad news for farmers as many crops are flowering and even if the flower isn't damaged by the cold, bees don't fly in cold weather so those flowers will not be pollinated. Watch for the price of fruit, nuts and berries to spike this summer...
Posted by DaveH at April 21, 2008 8:30 PM