{"id":18606,"date":"2012-01-31T14:41:19","date_gmt":"2012-01-31T22:41:19","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/blogs.kqed.org\/climatewatch\/?p=18606"},"modified":"2012-01-31T14:41:19","modified_gmt":"2012-01-31T22:41:19","slug":"drought-is-in-the-eye-of-the-beholder","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/ww2.kqed.org\/climatewatch\/2012\/01\/31\/drought-is-in-the-eye-of-the-beholder\/","title":{"rendered":"Drought Is in the Eye of the Beholder"},"content":{"rendered":"

Are we in one? Water officials say the answer is “Yes and No”<\/strong><\/p>\n

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How do you define a "drought?"<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

As state surveyors trudge into the mountains this week for the season’s second official survey of the Sierra snowpack, the auspices aren’t good. Remote sensors currently show that statewide, water content is averaging just 38% of the average for this date, and less than a quarter of what water managers would hope to see on April first — just two months away.<\/p>\n

Consequently, the “D-word” is being nervously bandied about. Are we in a drought?<\/p>\n

The state’s newly revamped Current Water Conditions website<\/a> takes on the question with a definitive “Yes and no.” Drought status, it says “can be very different depending on your location.”<\/p>\n

Matthew Heberger agrees. An analyst for the Oakland-based Pacific Institute<\/a> and co-author of The World’s Water<\/em><\/a> (Vol. 7), Heberger told me in a recent interview that it “absolutely depends on your perspective.” And that perspective is ruled by more than geography.<\/p>\n

“I\u2019m a hydrologist by training, so for a hydrologist, a drought would be reflected in changes in the natural environment,” he explained. “So, changes in ground water levels, lake levels, stream flows, things like that.”<\/p>\n

Heberger went on to offer some other perspectives:<\/p>\n