SWSIReportApril2006

• Title: Colorado Water Supply Conditions Report
• Date: 4/20/2006
• Description: Presentation
• Basin: Statewide
• Drought Mitigation - Doc Type: Presentation

SAN JUAN/DOLORES BASIN

Basinwide Conditions Assessment
The SWSI value of -1.3 indicates that for March the
basin water supplies were below normal. Flow at the gaging
station Animas River near Durango was 230 cfs, as
compared to the long-term average of 314 cfs. Storage in
McPhee, Vallecito. and Lemon reservoirs totaled 114% of
normal as of the end of March.
March weather finally broke the drier than normal
pattern of the previous four months. In Durango. 2.38
inches of precipitatIOn were recorded. 139% of average. So
far this water year Durango is at 76% of normal precipitation.
As of March 1" the snowpack for the San Juan River Basin
was only at 46% of normal; as of April 1" the snowpack had
increased to 68% of normal.
Stream flows dropped to below normal for the month
due to the lack of low level snowpack and snowmelt. The
Animas River peaked at 276 cfs on March 29th and
averaged just 230 cfs for the month, which is 73% of normal.
The Dolores River averaged 71 cfs for the month, well below
the 129 cfs normal. and the La Plata River at Hesperus
averaged only 7.1 cfs for the month compared with It'S
normal flow of 156 cfs
Reservoirs continued to be the bright spot in the
water supply outlook. The three major reservoirs still
maintained above average storage at the end of the month.
The cloudy weather kept the high temperatures
below normal and the low temperatures above normal.
Overall Durango was 2.20 below ItS 30-year average high
and 2.00 above its 3D-year average low.

Apr-06

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