Strong snowpack, wet spring turn around reservoir levels across Colorado

Jun. 20—A strong snowpack and a wet spring across Colorado have largely ended years of drought, bringing to life hillsides across the state with grass and wildflowers and recharging reservoirs that had dropped radically.

Seth Withrow, Sport Fish Colorado owner, watched the recovery at the Blue Mesa Reservoir west of Gunnison where levels dropped to record lows last year, forcing the Elk Creek Marina to close.

"It was getting pretty scary," he said.

But in recent months, lake levels have risen over 60 feet, he is fishing areas that were dry ground at the end of last season and the landscape is the greenest he has seen it in a long time, he said. The marina is also back open.

Across the state, the Colorado and Gunnison river basin on the Western Slope saw "by far the most dramatic increases in reservoir storage anywhere in the state" this spring, said Karl Wetlaufer, a hydrologist and assistant supervisor with the Natural Resource Conservation Service. He displayed a graph showing reservoir levels in the basin shooting straight back up to average at an online meeting Tuesday of the state's Water Availability Task Force.

Lingering snowpack, high stream flows and recovering reservoirs is largely the story across most of the state, his data showed, with the most impressive numbers on the Western Slope.

As a whole reservoir storage is strong across the state with the lakes that Denver and Colorado Springs rely on having more water than they would normally, in part, because a wet spring delayed demand to keep lawns and gardens alive, officials from both water providers said at a meeting of the state's Water Availability Task Force.

May is usually the wettest month along the Front Range and the northeast portion of the state, but the rainfall from May 1 through mid-June has far exceeded normal levels of 2.5 to 3.5 inches, said Becky Bolinger, assistant state climatologist. Since May 1, northern Douglas County has seen 15.23 inches of rain, among the highest in the Denver area. Arapahoe and Elbert counties have seen more than 13 inches of rain, her data showed.

The El Paso County area has kept pace, seeing between 10.23 inches and 13.6 inches in different areas, the data showed.

The Western Slope has not seen drenching rain, with most counties seeing less than 4 inches in that area in the same period.

The weather patterns are expected to change, Bolinger said, with a shift to higher temperatures at the end of the month and into July and as the summer progresses.

"There is a slight risk of excessive heat over a lot of the state," she said.

Flooding is expected to remain a risk because the rains have soaked the soils and she expected burn scars to be particularly vulnerable.

The current El Niño patterns are likely to keep the state out of drought in coming months and bring wetter weather in the fall to a large portion of the state, excluding some southern counties.

However, the state will dry out again and when that happens the risk of wildfire is likely to be higher, Bolinger said, because the rain has given rise to so much vegetation that will dry out and become fuel.

In the short-term, some of the main beneficiaries of the rain — vegetable and fruit growers — are looking forward to some sunshine. Marilyn Bay Drake, executive director at Colorado Fruit & Vegetable Growers Association, said while none of her producers are complaining about the rain, the storms brought their own challenges, including forcing a delay in planting, washing out crops, hail damage and aggressive weeds.

But farmers are optimistic about the end of the season and classic Colorado crops, such as chile and sweet corn, she said.

"Things will catch up," she said.

At Blue Mesa, summer weather has also been delayed, with a recent fishing trip getting underway when it was still 36 degrees, Withrow said.

However, the cooler weather should keep the water colder into August, keeping more oxygen in the water and creating a healthier environment for fish. Those factors will hopefully contribute to a better salmon spawn, he said.

"I anticipate a longer, better season," he said.