Sierra Journal

Sierra Snowpack 81% of Normal

And here I thought we had a huge year. Must be the law of shifting baselines. With more bad years than good years lately, even a normal year is starting to feel like a great year, ya know?

Of course my thoughts are always with ski conditions, but there is a much more serious concern: water resources for all of us around California.

For more on CA water resources see here. 

From Mercury News:

There appears to be plenty of snow in the Sierra Nevada, but California water officials said Thursday it falls short of the amount needed to replenish the state's reservoirs.

Across the 400-mile-long mountain range, the snowpack is holding about 81 percent of its usual statewide water content, according to the fourth Sierra snow survey conducted by the state Department of Water Resources.

The department's snow chief, Frank Gehrke, says the snowpack needed to be between 120 percent and 130 percent of average by the beginning of April to replenish the state's key reservoirs.

The smaller snowpack follows two previously dry winters and is one reason farmers and cities throughout California — including in Silicon Valley — have been told they will get less water this year.

"It's not nearly enough to bolster the water supply picture statewide," said Gehrke.

Sierra Road Repair Project on I 80 Begins Today

If you're a bay area mountain fanatic like yours-truly, then you spend an inordinate amount of time in your truck on your way to, or on your way back from, the mountains.

Well, be ready to experience some serious traffic headaches this summer. A massive I 80 road project got under way this morning that will at times close the highway through the Sierra.

You know those annoying ruts in the right lane from countless semi-trucks driving through crazy Sierra weather with chained tires? They're gonna get fixed! Pretty cool, and I know it's necessary, but man I am NOT looking forward to this.

Go to www.getacross80.com for live traffic updates, email alerts, detour maps, live traffic cams and such.

Or, for updates on the road, you can call 1-877-362-8080 for recorded info.

From GetAcross80.com:

The Sierra Nevada portions of I-80 have been diligently maintained by Caltrans for more than five decades. Because of the severe weather conditions that Sierra winters create along I-80, the roadways have become severely worn and are in need of repair.

Looking good for this weekend

Weather's looking up for this coming weekend in North Tahoe. I worry about avalanche conditions though. When we headed back to SF on Sunday it was a downpour. Hopefully a week's worth of snow will bond with the top layer of rain crust so we can all get out and enjoy some steep and deep.

Retreat of the Dana Glacier (Video)

Check out the toll a hundred years of global warming can take on a fragile Sierra glacier. This photographer is going all over the Sierra taking photos of all the glaciers for comparison with historical photos. In the video below, he describes his process and then captures an image of the Dana glacier.

The Dana Couloir above the glacier, incidentally, is a killer ice climb in the fall and an awesome ski descent in the winter/spring. The trailhead is near Tioga Pass on the east side of Yosemite. If you haven't been, I'd highly recommend you go check this out yourself. It's gorgeous up there.

Via The Cleanest Line.

The sixth mass extinction?

There have been 5 major extinction events in the history of life on planet earth. Now a study done on Sierra Nevada amphibians, published in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, found that Sierra Nevada amphibians are in severe danger of extinction and that this may be a sign of things to come - even suggesting that we may be in the midst of the sixth major extinction event. From LA Times Greenspace:

Of the Sierra Nevada's seven amphibian species, five are threatened. Two of these species, the Sierra Nevada yellow-legged frog and the Southern yellow-legged frog, had their populations decline by up to 98% over the last few years, even in highly-protected areas such as Yosemite National Park.

Ooh... ahhh... new Yosemite postage stamp

From the LA Times:

The 42-cent first-class stamp features Albert Bierstadt’s painting “Valley of the Yosemite.” Yosemite’s Postmaster Bill Carroll as well as park Superintendent Mike Tollefson will be on hand for the ceremony. The original 1864 oil painting belongs to the Museum of Fine Arts in Boston, according to a U.S. Postal Service release. The Yosemite stamp will be on sale nationwide starting Thursday — and also will be rolled out at the American Philatelic Society StampShow 2008 in Hartford, Connecticut.

Newspaper series covers warming in the Sierra

The Sacramento Bee recently published their first in a series of stories on the effects of global warming on the Sierra. This is written by Tom Knudson, who blogs for the SacBee at Sierra Summit.

Of course this issue hits very close to home for us Sierra climbers. The changing landscape dramatically affects the mountain cirques, meadows, valleys and glaciers that we tend to hold near-sacred. But taking a long hard look at the effects of warming on mountains is important for reasons that go way beyond climbers' self-interests. Since higher elevations feel the effects of global warming before the rest of the landscape, the mountains tend to act as the proverbial "canary in the coalmine." Kudos to the SacBee for helping put a global issue into local relief.

From the Sacramento Bee:

Starting today, The Bee will begin to chronicle this warming world, to explore an environmental meltdown scientists say is more far-reaching than any in recorded history.

In print and online at www.sacbee. com/sierrawarming, we will take you from the foothills to the timberline and beyond to reveal a landscape where the imprint of climate change is being detected in a surprising number of ways, from the growing rampage of unruly and destructive wildfires to the scamper of chipmunks and other species upslope toward cooler weather.

"When I started doing climate change research in the Sierra Nevada around 1990, it seemed like an abstraction," said Nathan Stephenson, a research ecologist with the U.S. Geological Survey in Three Rivers near Sequoia and Kings Canyon national parks.

Now, it's in sharp focus. "Over the last five years, the canary in the coal mine died," said Stephenson, whose research has tied a rise in tree mortality in the Sierra to rising temperatures. "It's almost a shock to find out how many things are changing and how rapidly they are changing."

Yosemite "Telegraph" fire completely contained

The week-long ordeal claimed 28 homes...   burned 53 square miles and cost....  $37 million to fight! Yikes. But it ain't over yet.

From the AP:

Meanwhile, a storm front forecast to move into California caused fire officials to worry that stronger winds and more lightning will spark new blazes and make fighting the remaining ones harder.

By Tuesday night, lightning had started a few fires in the Inyo National Forest, including one that burned less than a square mile near Bishop but threatened no structures.

Progress on Yosemite wildfire, but more is on the way

Firefighter crews are making progress on the Yosemite fire, but there is sure to be another fire right around the corner. More acres have burned this year than any other, even though we're not even half way through fire season. Yikes...

From SF Chronicle:

The 53-square-mile blaze sparked by a target shooter was 45 percent contained Thursday as firefighters shored up fire lines around residential areas along its southern and eastern edges. It has destroyed 21 homes, caused hundreds to evacuate and for days spit up clouds of ash that obscured the park's granite peaks...

California is not even halfway through its fire season, but more acres have burned here this year than in any other, according to Alisha Herring, spokeswoman for the California Department of Forestry and Fire Protection.

More than 2,000 blazes have scorched 1,875 square miles in California already this year. In 2007 nearly 1,720 square miles were charred when blazes raged across Southern California, Herring said.

State of Thirst: CA's Water Future

This video aired a couple of weeks ago on Quest, a KQED series exploring northern California science, environment and nature. It's definitely worth watching. It explores California's problems with water supplies.

All that water starts in the Sierra as snow, then melts, flows down mountain streams and ends up in either the San Joaquin or Sacramento rivers which empty into the delta, then into the San Francisco bay and out into the ocean. Here in San Francisco, our water comes from the Hetch Hetchy reservoir in Yosemite. It's good to remember that the stuff you ski (or climb) on in the mountains is literally the same stuff you shower with at home - and it's all in short supply.