(Orleans)– A heavy snow pack this past winter has helped bring water levels in the Iowa Great Lakes back up, at least somewhat. Mike Hawkins, a fisheries biologist with the Iowa Department of Natural Resources, says they are seeing improvements in levels from what they were last fall…
“Currently Big Spirit Lake is about five inches below the crest of the dam, so the top of the dam here on the south end of the lake, which is up, you know, pretty good from last fall. West Okoboji and the Okoboji chain that go out at Lower Gar is actually right at crest level, so we’re actually seeing a little bit of water trickle over the dam at West Okoboji. And if we look historically at those levels, pretty close to average. We’re actually maybe just a little bit above average for this time of year and those records go back all the way into the 1930’s, so it gives us some pretty good perspective. I don’t know how much additional water the snow pack will give us. I know our ground moisture levels are really low. A lot of the wetlands are starting tore-fill and we’re starting to see some of our shallow lakes actually flow out as well. So a good sign, but I know we’re going to lose a lot of some of this melt to ground water as well.”
Hawkins says another question as of right now is just how much moisture from the snow pack in areas of southwest Minnesota will make it into Big Spirit Lake…
“About a third of what Big Spirit gets for water comes from the Minnesota portion. It’s kind of a small, narrow strip of land that runs all the way up to Interstate 90 and yeah, as that water melts and comes down, and again part of that water is going to go to ground water and some of it is going to be run off down to the lakes, and so it’s just kind of interesting to kind of understand that difference. But we do know that groundwater levels or ground moisture is very low.”
Several long range predictions are calling for a continuation of above normal precipitation well into April.
