The Associated Press | Posted: Wednesday, November 29, 2006 6:00 pm
SCOTTSBLUFF — Farmers in the Pathfinder Irrigation District in western Nebraska are getting used to working with less water after six years of drought.
And district manager Dennis Strauch said they shouldn’t expect much improvement next year unless the Wyoming mountains receive significant snowfall this winter.
That’s because there isn’t much water carry-over in reservoirs along the North Platte River.
Irrigators are learning to raise a good crop with 75 to 80 percent of the irrigation water they used to get, Strauch said.
In 2000, about 1.7 million acre-feet of water was left in the reservoirs. But now the carry-over is half of that.
Seminoe, Pathfinder and Glendo reservoirs are between 20 and 28 percent full. Guernsey is about 6 percent full.