With all this flooding now, why talk of a drought this summer?

This article was published on: 02/21/14 5:22 PM

The Deschutes River and its tributaries are fed by melting snow from the Cascade Mountains. When we get rain and warmer weather in the winter and early spring, it melts the snow pack, sometimes dramatically increasing stream flows and thereby reducing the amount of snow stored in the mountains.  That means less snow remains to melt into stream flows during the summer and fall.

As of February 21st, 2014, snow pack in the Cascades is at 62% of normal. We will need a significant increase in spring snowfall to turn this around.

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