With the lack of rainfall since the start of the year, drought concerns across Oregon are starting to increase. Impact categories include agriculture, business and industry, energy, fire, plants and wildlife, public health, tourism and recreation, and water supply. This is a period of abnormally low snowpack caused by a lack of overall precipitation; a lack of snow accumulation, possibly because warmer temperatures bring rain instead of snow; or unusually early snowmelt. 4 0 obj

The timing is critical: In Oregon the snow has been coming later and the snowmelt starting earlier, which not only means less time for the snowpack to build, but also that what water there is arrives before it’s most needed, in the summer.No snow: White winters arriving later and snowmelt occurring earlier has been resulting in snowpack releasing less water far sooner than when it’s crucially needed—the summer. Drought Affects Parts of Oregon, Bend Urges Conservation Oregon Gov. Precipitation and temperature are the main drivers of drought. <>/ExtGState<>/XObject<>/ProcSet[/PDF/Text/ImageB/ImageC/ImageI] >>/Annots[ 11 0 R] /MediaBox[ 0 0 612 792] /Contents 4 0 R/Group<>/Tabs/S/StructParents 0>> Almost half of the state is in severe or extreme drought, primarily affecting north-central, south-central, and southwest Oregon. Climate change is certainly affecting snowpack, but a recent study suggests that natural weather variations may have shielded the Cascade Mountains from the full impacts of global warming. Extreme drought (D3) formed across the southwest corner of Oregon in the middle of April, and continues to slowly increase with every week. Low river levels make life difficult for fish such as spawning salmon that thrive on the surge of cold snowmelt; it also affects fishing and other activities on which tourism and local economies rely.

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But increasingly for Oregon, the billion-dollar question is Snowpack, the snow that collects and stays frozen on mountains for months, is a natural water reservoir. Indeed, several years of low snowpack have made a new drought definition necessary—snow drought. A big economic loser is agriculture: without summer irrigation from snowpack water, crops wilt, pastures brown, and farmers have to buy in feed for livestock—Oregon’s 2015 drought Reduced snowmelt can have devastating knock-on effects, as less moisture in the soil during spring and summer months dries out vegetation—even trees are susceptible.With the likelihood of less snowpack in the future, Oregon will have to adapt.

One or more irrigation districts could be limited this year, said Jeremy Giffin, the Deschutes Basin watermaster, due to drought conditions that have afflicted Central Oregon for several years.

%PDF-1.7 Drought at the start of the 2016 water year in Oregon. The study covers an area stretching across nine U.S. states from Oregon down to New Mexico. From 2010 to 2014, the PDX area experienced near to well above-normal rainfall, and since 2015, the region has been experiencing below-normal rainfall, with May 2018 being the driest May observed for the region, only reaching .17 inches.The Climate Prediction Center (NOAA) shows in their long-range forecasts that we, along with the rest of the West Coast, are likely to continue experiencing below-normal rainfall this summer. This year the historical values will be updated to include the last decade and the new normal will take into account the warm temperatures, early snowmelts, and prolonged dry stretches of recent years.

By Associated Press , …