Trinity Lake level low, but resorts and Forest Service optimistic

April 5, 2009

The state's system of reservoirs is trending toward bone dry, and the popular Northern California summer-time haunt of Trinity Lake is no exception.

Trinity Lake is 94 feet below high water -- 61 percent of the average since 1962. Going into a warm season following last year's wildfire-smoke choked summer with one of the most refreshing assets of the region so depleted has some people worried.

”People are just not booking because of that,” said Amy Kasper at Trinity Lake Resorts and Marina.

But even with the lake as low as it is, the Trinity County reservoir is still huge. Full, it can store 2.4 million acre feet -- enough water to cover 2.4 million acres one foot deep. At its current level, it is holding 1.2 million acre feet.

That means that six of seven boat ramps on the lake are well out of water and are likely to stay that way this season. The Minersville boat ramp has plenty of leeway, usable to about 200 feet below high water, said Shasta-Trinity National Recreation Area Recreation Resource Officer Mary Ellen Grigsby.

Grigsby added that the 17,000-acre lake still has 8,000 to 10,000 acres of surface water even at its low stage -- plenty to fish, swim and boat.

”Once you get out on it, it's still a big lake,” Grigsby said.

Those concerned about Trinity Lake's levels can also hit the smaller Lewiston and Whiskytown lakes, Grigsby said, both of which are kept full to serve hydropower operations.

The state Department of Water Resources last week released the results of its snowpack surveys, which found California little better off than when Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger declared a drought state of emergency at the end of February. The snowpack average is 81 percent of normal, not nearly enough to replenish the state's reservoirs after two years of drought. Some of those storage facilities are perilously low, like Lake Oroville at 56 percent capacity, which has prompted water conservation measures in many areas.

While the Trinity River watershed's snowpack measurements were being completed Friday, it appears that they will come in at between 75 and 80 percent.

”It's certainly in that ballpark,” said Frank Gehrke, chief of California's Cooperative Snow Surveys Program.

Gehrke said that up to 10 percent of the runoff from that snowmelt will likely be absorbed by soils parched from the dry fall.

That means less water to fill the lake. While the forecast used to determine how releases from Lewiston Dam into the Trinity River will be managed is still being drawn up, the amount of water sent to the river for salmon -- and how much is diverted to the Sacramento River for Central Valley farms -- can also affect the level of Trinity Lake. That schedule should be finalized in mid-April.

The year is so far being considered “critically dry,” in which the least water is let down the river, said Pete Lucero, spokesman for the U.S. Bureau of Reclamation. But the river flows and diversion to the Sacramento could also draw down the reservoir to some 720,000 acre feet, dropping the elevation of the lake even farther.

However, Lucero said, February and March wet weather may push that to a slightly damper forecast which would come close to maintaining the lake level through the season.

”Things could change if April brings us major weather events,” Lucero said. “I've looked at the long-term forecast and I haven't seen anything like that.”

It's almost certain that, barring big storms, Trinity Lake will remain low. Grigsby said, however, that she expects campgrounds to be more full than they were during last year's smoky summer. Without wildfires, and with gas prices far below last year's, Grigsby said, people will undoubtedly show up.

”We still have plenty of water to go boating and all that other stuff,” Kasper said.