Aquifer Recharge & Expanded Drought Area
Aquifer Recharge & Expanded Drought Area. I'm Greg Martin with today's Northwest Report.
On Friday, Washington Gov. Jay Inslee expanded the states drought emergency with nearly half of the sate included. During a conference call Ecology Director Maia Bellon discussed the plan.
BELLON: Average snowpack is 24%, a record low in many areas. That's lower than 2005 when the last statewide drought was declared. In these 13 river basins the drought declarations allows us to provide funds to the Department of Fish & Wildlife to mitigate the impacts of reduced streamflows for fish, it allows us to work with the Department of Agriculture to transfer water from irrigation of lower value crops like hay and pasture to higher value crops like apples, cherries and pears.
Idaho's Eastern Snake Plan Aquifer has been declining at a rate of about 200,000 acre-feet a year for the past 60 years or so. The aquifer provides water for dozens of small cities and towns across a wide swath of southern Idaho. The Idaho Department of Water Resources has figured out a way to refill the aquifer and started recharging it this past winter using excess flows from the winter and spring runoff and put it back through dry canals to seep back into the aquifer. It will take some time but the news is positive.
That's today's Northwest Report. I'm Greg Martin on the Ag Information Network of the West.
