Washington Snowpack Ho-Hum For Early March

When it comes to the snowpack in Washington’s higher elevations, it’s not looking bad; but it’s also not looking fabulous.  That’s how Scott Pattee with NRCS-Washington is describing the statewide snowpack, which is sitting at 99% of average.  Pattee noted while the Northwest has seen several storms roll across the area over the past couple of weeks, it hasn’t resulted in massive snow accumulations.

“As much as anything, except in just a couple of isolated places, in the state, it’s kind of been maintenance snow that we've been getting and precipitation.  And so we haven't really gained a lot you know that that 99% is only two percentage points more than we were just six days ago before this last storm cycle hit.”

Pattee noted that snowpack numbers right now run from just under 110% of average to the low 80s.  And he added the inconsistency is occurring on both sides of the Cascades.

“As a good example, right now on the lower Yakima we're still sitting at only 83% of normal we just can't seem to catch a break there in that area.  And Klickitat is at 89% [of normal], Naches is 87% which is a little bit of an increase from a few days ago.  And we see the same thing with the West side.  The North Puget Sound, again the furthest away from the storm tracks, is sitting at 88% of average.  Whereas the central Puget, in that Everett/Seattle convergence zone is 106% of typical.  So, numbers are just kind of all over the board this year.”

What does this mean as producers start to think about the irrigation season in the coming weeks?

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