Drought — Mountains Southwest Shasta County To Northern Lake County, California

2015-04-01 to 2015-04-30 · Mountains Southwest Shasta County To Northern Lake County, California

Event narrative

The drought is impacting Lake County, with farmers clipping some wine grape vines, reducing irrigation needed this summer, while reducing their harvest. Agriculture and related businesses have lost jobs.

Wider weather episode

The long term drought continues as April was yet another below normal month for precipitation for much of the area. There was some mountain snowfall, but this did little to improve the snow pack, which remained at the lowest levels on record. By the end of April, the snow pack was only about 4 percent of normal levels. As a result, reservoirs across the area by the end of April remained well below normal levels with little or no spring rise, due to the lack of snow melt.

Extreme drought was detected by the U.S. Drought Monitor across most the region, with exceptional drought for the northern San Joaquin Valley, the central and southern Sacramento Valley, the Burney Basin and the Sierra south of Interstate 80.

Governor Jerry Brown declared a drought emergency for the entire state of California January 17, 2014 and this continued to be in effect.

Local Emergency Proclamations have been issued for El Dorado, Glenn, Lake, Plumas, San Joaquin, Shasta, Sutter, Tuolumne, and Yuba counties. The cities of Live Oak Lodi, and Ripon continue in a drought emergency. Drought task forces have been established in Butte, Lake, Nevada, Placer, Plumas, Sacramento, San Joaquin, Stanislaus, Sutter, Tehama, Tuolumne, and Yolo counties to coordinate response to the drought.

Mandatory water reductions of 25 percent as ordered by Governor Brown were in effect statewide, the first time such mandatory restrictions have been enacted.

Agriculture has been heavily impacted, with numerous farm and farm related jobs lost. Spring planting is being scaled back significantly, with many existing tree crops and vines being removed due to a lack of irrigation water. The state continued to supply food assistance to those impacted. California Disaster Assistance Act money continued to be provided for those who have lost drinking water due to dry wells.

There was a large decrease in the snow-related tourism activity in the mountains due to the lack of snow, with many resorts closing early in the month or having already closed in March.

Source: NOAA Storm Events Database, event_id 568227. Narrative written by the NWS forecast office that issued the report.