High Sierra Topix

This was posted by the PCTA from John Dittli's info. If there is allot more snow this year than the last 2 especially with the Kern River showing double the amount of snow then the water levels should be low but not crazy. The green grass and flowers will die earlier but not too early and the mosquitoes should be less and go away quicker than a normal year so I think all around it should be a really nice year up there!

http://www.pcta.org/2014/state-snowpack ... rra-18573/" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

Interesting and informative read thanks for posting it Rogue. This article states that
Tuolumne is at 48%, but the Yosemite NP site writes:

The April 1 snow surveys showed snowpack was at 33% of average in the Tuolumne
River drainage and 28% of average in the Merced River drainage.

Why is there a 15% difference, which is very high, between the two surveys? Is the
Yosemite survey taking the whole drainage into consideration? Why would the surveyors
in Yosemite include the whole drainage to come up with their numbers as opposed to
only areas above 9000 ft as the group of surveyors in this article? John if you read
this could you please chime in on these measurement differences.

thanks for the heads up Mav.

I wrote that report at the request of the PCTA. Due to all the media attention of California's drought, many recreationalists are assuming that since Calif. is at 25% of average, that the Sierra is practically snow free. I haven't found that the case on my tours this year and the numbers support that it is actually snowier then the last two winters at high elevation. The numbers I published are the only place you'll see those. I knew that the lower elevations were dry, but I was curious to the amount of snow up high (>10,000 south, >9,000 north). So I took our upper elevation course data (actual measurements, not SnoTel) and averaged that out, disregarding lower elevation data.

The reason my numbers are different than the posted numbers on CDEC is that the latter reflect the average from ALL course elevations, not just the high ones. My numbers are for recreational purposes only and mean very little in regard to California's water situation. The dismal fact still stands; California is at ~25% of average. The bright side is that the high elevations may not be as parched this summer as they could be!

oops and now I re-read your post Mav and I think you were asking why the difference between Merced and Tuolumne, sorry about that. I've never really thought about this before, but it could be that the courses on the Merced are lower than those on the Tuolumne. This year that could easily account for a 15% difference.

The reason my numbers are different than the posted numbers on CDEC is that the latter
reflect the average from ALL course elevations, not just the high ones.

Thanks for clarifying things John, this was my thought too.