Platte's already drying

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by algis J. Laukaitis

Some stretches of the Platte River are so dry — and overgrown with vegetation — that you couldn't tell a river used to run through it.


It's "difficult to recognize it as a river," said Dan Hitch, a federal hydraulic technician in North Platte.


Choked by a fifth year of drought, the state's longest river is vanishing earlier this year than normal, forcing farmers to scrounge for water, worrying downstream city officials and threatening to drop Lake McConaughy to the lowest level since it was built.

At the Grand Island gauge, the Platte was registering zero flows all week, according to the U.S. Geological Survey.


"The important thing to realize is that over a 70-year record at this gauge, the average flow on June 10 is 2,095 cubic feet per second," Hitch said. "Now it's zero to 3 cfs."


It wasn't much stronger upstream, between Kearney and Lexington. The river there was flowing at 11 cubic feet per second — a mere trickle when it comes to river flows.


"You would hardly get the bottom of your tennis shoes wet," Hitch said.


Or your crops.


Cozad-area farmer Ron Stear, president of the Cozad Ditch Co., said his irrigators would be lucky to have a 30-day supply of water this summer. He said about one-third of them would have to supplement that with groundwater.


And to force those irrigators with wells to tap their groundwater, the ditch company will charge $70 per acre for river water this year — nearly triple the usual $25 per acre.


Will they pay?


"If it's a choice of water or no water, $70 is high but you have to have it because you can't grow anything without water," he said.


Richard Hass, president of the Central Irrigation District based in Gering, said this was the lowest he'd seen the North Platte River in 42 years. His district will get only one-third of its normal allocation of storage water this season, he said.


In a typical June, flows into Lake McConaughy, the state's largest reservoir, average 1,200 to 1,300 cubic feet per second. On Thursday, they measured 80 to 90 cfs.


"It's very disturbing," said Tim Anderson, spokesman for the Central Nebraska Public Power and Irrigation District, which owns and operates the reservoir.


The lake rose 15 feet this spring from flows that came from mountain snowpack and Wyoming reservoirs. It didn't do much. The lake is at 35 percent of capacity and dropping.


"We're down four feet already," Anderson said. "It's the first week in June, and we haven't started irrigation."


Most of the water was used to fill canals to carry water to Central's 1,300 downstream customers. The district will have enough water this summer to meet demand, he said.


But the future looks bleak.


"Unless we get some real good rains in June, July and August, the lake will be very, very low," he said.


If rains don't come, at the end of this year's irrigation season McConaughy will be at its lowest level since it was filled in 1941, Anderson said.


Some irrigators will supplement water supplies by pumping water from wells sunk into aquifers. But Anderson called that a "double whammy," because they also will be depleting groundwater resources.


"In the last three years there have been some fairly significant declines (in groundwater levels) in the Platte Valley," he said.


Bob Smith, assistant utilities director for Grand Island, is "most definitely" concerned about the lack of flows in the Platte this early. The flows help establish a "hydraulic barrier" between the city's wellfield and nearby farmland that contributes to high nitrate levels in the water. The hydraulic barrier helps ensure that the city has a quality water supply, Smith said.


And the Platte is not the only river in trouble.


Stretching across southern Nebraska, the Republican River has dropped steadily since the middle of May.


"It's pretty much a small stream at McCook," said Craig Scott, a hydraulic engineer with the U.S. Bureau of Reclamation. "It's just water pooled up in the river. It's not flowing much."


The situation is so dire the Frenchman-Cambridge Irrigation District told its customers it wouldn't deliver any water this year.


Also, inflows into Harlan County Reservoir are tapering off and the reservoir is dropping, mostly due to evaporation, Scott said.


The outlook for the rest of the summer isn't good.


Said Scott: "If this dry weather pattern continues, the river will be pretty much be dry and our reservoirs will continue to drop from evaporation."


Even a good rain doesn't seem to help. Earlier this week, more than 3 inches fell in the Swanson Reservoir area. Most of it soaked into the dry ground.


Reach Algis J. Laukaitis at 473-7243 or alaukaitis@journalstar.com.