Got Water?

[Pedaling Fool]

Been looking at the drought conditions for the U.S. and much of the appalachians are in a drought, not really bad, but it's something to watch.

If you look at the two maps you can pick a date and look at the drought history and compare to today's status http://drought.unl.edu/dm/archive.html


And if you look at this map it lists both drought types (A -- Agricultural & H -- Hydrological). Although I wonder how they get that information WRT the mountains, I'm thinking maybe no one even looks at much of it, but regardless if the area is in a drought the mountain sources will be affected. http://drought.unl.edu/dm/monitor.html


Bottom line, you may want to play it safe and always have some water on hand.

[daddytwosticks]

Been very dry down here in the valleys. People think the two snowstorms we had in Dec and Jan kept us out of trouble...not so. We are supposed to get some good rain this weekend. We need it.

[Pedaling Fool]

Been very dry down here in the valleys. People think the two snowstorms we had in Dec and Jan kept us out of trouble...not so. We are supposed to get some good rain this weekend. We need it.

It really does have to be a lot of snow to help recover from a drought.

It's an interesting thought of how percipitation helps in the recovery of low-running springs, since that water is coming from under the ground. If an area is very dry the soil will soak up any moisture before water can drain to under ground water sources. Many people don't appreciate how much water the soil will hold and not allow one drop to go any further. In other words underground water is not getting very much water until the soil has its fill.

[LIhikers]

I haven't recovered from shoveling snow yet and now I've got to worry about this too?

[johnnybgood]

I haven't recovered from shoveling snow yet and now I've got to worry about this too?

Yep . The Whites have seen plenty of snow this winter.

[XCskiNYC]

Around here last year the weather was warm and sunny almost every day from at least early April through the fall. For example, it was in the 70's and sunny around Great Barrington early in April. It just stayed that way. There were months that got two days of rain total (often with the days next to each other; almost all the rain for the month would fall, say, on a Tuesday, maybe 1.25 inches, with the remaining 0.25 the next day).

Hiking in Bear Mtn. and Harriman State parks on the 4th of July weekend I found just one natural water source on the AT, Beechy Bottom Brook. It was very muddy.

The NY-NJ Trail Council had warnings up most of the summer about the lack of water. You had to keep an eye out for chances to fill up with water and carry more than usual.

I wonder if this year will be a repeat as far as the weather goes. It's not fun to have one of those seasons like 2009 with day after day of heavy rain but it's also a pain to have to have so much extra water weight to keep aboard a safe quantity.

[Mountain Mike]

I thru-hiked in 88. The year the barges were getting stuck in the Misissippi. By the time I got to NJ in July leaves were falling off the trees from lack of water. Just took a little more planning out our days. Was good training for deserts of PCT

[Graywolf]

When I sectioned Georgia in 09' They were still in the drought from 08', It was August, so of course the water would have already been low. I still had no problem getting water, although from what I heard, they were lower than normal.

I always try to carry extra water just for this purpose. You never know when a stream will dry up..

Graywolf