4-20 IAN March Snow

 Jeff Anderson, NRCS Hydrologist in Boise  gave me a fairly comprehensive look at snowpack in Idaho because obviously our agricultural community is totally dependent upon water. “Warm weather melted some of the low and mid elevation snowpack in the southern Idaho basins of Bear, Blackfoot, Bruneau, Owyhee, and Portneuf decreasing the snowpack up to 22 percent. With little March snowfall across southern Idaho many of those basins have snowpacks in the dismal range of 40 to 60% of normal.

On the other side of the coin, many areas north of the Snake River Plain received above average precipitation and snowpacks increased up to 34 percent. March storms left the Panhandle snowpack at about 120% of normal. Snowpacks in the middle of Idaho range from 80 to 110% of normal. Currently most of the state looks really good particularly north of the Snake River Plain  where a lot of those basins have better than average snowpacks. Streamflow forecasts rose due to the increased snowpack.The abundant carry over water stored in Idaho reservoirs may be a problem in some areas that received abundant March precipitation. Reservoirs in southern Idaho are holding an above normal water supply and should accommodate the lower than normal runoff due to the low snowpack this year.   Things are looking good compared to what they look like a month or so ago. March brought up to 3 times the amount of normal precipitation. It set a 30 year record for the month of March. March for the last 2 years has been a month that really changed our water supply.