Southern Oregon preparing for possible drought

MEDFORD, Ore. (AP) -- Rainfall and snowpacks are below normal for this time of year in Southern Oregon, raising worries about a possible drought this summer.

"I'd prefer to see some snow and rain right now when we have a minimal snowpack ," said Jim Pendleton, manager of the Talent Irrigation District, which relies on reservoirs filled with runoff from the mountain snowpack.

Both Hyatt and Howard Prairie reservoirs in the Cascade Range, the principal storage sources of water for summer irrigation, are only 70 percent to 80 percent full, Pendleton said.

On Friday, the National Weather Service said rainfall was only 6.53 inches in Medford since September, more than 3 inches below the average 9.68 inches for this time of year.

January rainfall is nine-tenths of an inch, about half of the 1.76-inch average for the month thus far.

"It makes us nervous," Pendleton said. "But it's way too soon to get spun up about the lack of water. It can turn around with one good storm."

While the statewide snowpack is near average, there are some high elevations sites in Southern Oregon where it is well below normal, said Jon Lea, Oregon snow survey supervisor for the Natural Resources Conservation Service.

The agency works with the U.S. Forest Service to keep tabs on mountain winter snowpacks by taking both manual surveys and using snow telemetry devices that automatically measure the water content in the snow at remote sites.

Lea agreed with Pendleton that there is plenty of time to make up the snowpack deficit. The statewide snowpack and rainfall are both 96 percent of average, he said.

And some telemetry sites in Southern Oregon are showing good results. Near Diamond Lake, at 5,280 feet, the current measure is 125 percent of average for this time of year, with 13.9 inches of snow water, he said.

But at other sites, snow has been scarce.

At Big Red Mountain near Mount Ashland, at 6,050 feet above sea level, snow-water content was reported at 7.6 inches, putting it at 52 percent of average, Lea said.

Last year at this time the telemetry site registered 22.6 inches of snow water, reflecting 138 percent of average.

The report from King Mountain near Azalea recently indicated the snowpack at 4,340 feet had only a half inch of snow-water content, an extremely low 21 percent of average.

At the end of January a year ago, the King Mountain site reported 16.6 inches of water, which was a whopping 488 percent of average.

Some of that extra snow from last year will help ease any shortage this year, Pendleton said.

"We had a huge snowpack to play with last year so we had adequate carryover in the reservoirs," he said.

"But we'll be paying attention," he said.