National Weather Service Officials say snowpack levels in the Black Hills are below average this year, largely due to the warmer weather.
They say barring spring rain and snow, water levels in area streams and lakes could be much lower this summer than last year.
This year, officials say snow pack levels in the Black Hills are roughly 25 percent below average, with much of the snow having already melted.
The Natural Resources Conservation Service measures snowpack in the black hills each year. Jason Nehl with the NRCS and says runoff from melted snow is below average this year.
“I don’t think we’re going to see any high water levels from the warm weather and melting snowpack. A lot of the runoff has already happened at the lower elevations. I don’t see runoff being, oh maybe 80 percent of normal if the current trend continues. I don’t see it being an issue. If we do have high runoff, it’ll be most likely due to rain of late season snow storms,” says Nehl.
National Weather Service officials say there is currently snow in the higher elevations of the Black Hills but none in the plains. Melissa Smith is a hydrologist with the National Weather Service in Rapid City.
“You know, this winter we had a relatively mild winter. Most of that was due to the El Niño or the warm waters in the eastern Pacific Ocean, around the equator. And those warm waters down there just kind of kept our storm track over the southern United States so up here in the Northern Plains we really didn’t see as much snow and plus temperatures were above average for most of the winter,” Smith says.
Smith says a warming trend is expected for this coming weekend. But she adds that April is typically the snowiest month and a spring snow storm isn’t out of the question.