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Thank you for joining us for Fronteras A Changing America.

I'm KC Counts.

The Associated Press recently reported that Colorado just had its worst snowpack since statewide recordkeeping began in 1941.

Even more troubling, mountain snow accumulations peaked a month early and contained just half the average moisture as a warm winter gave way to early springtime record heat.

Snow is vanishing from all but the highest elevations in the west that has the region bracing for the impact on water availability and a potentially explosive fire season.

We'll talk about all of that and more with state climatologist Doctor David DuBois.

Thank you for joining us.

It's great to be here.

And Happy Earth Month.

Thank you.

We have a lot to talk about related to our Earth and what's happening on it over the course of the next 20 minutes or so.

So let's get right to it and talk a little bit about the winter snowpack that we just referenced and how bad it was.

Yeah.

So you mentioned Colorado.

We're also in the same boat.

And as of a lot of the southwest, even including California.

So New Mexico, you know, this is the kind of this is basically the time when we reach peak snow water equivalent.

That's our measure of the amount of liquid that's in the snow that will eventually melt out and then go down to our rivers.

And so we've seen a lot of our, high mountain elevation already melt out, and some of them melt out months ago.

You know, this is April.

And so we've had some in the Pecos basically melt out in January.

And so if you're in northern New Mexico, you can kind of see there's there's patches of snow where there you shouldn't be patches of snow.

And so that's, that's our problem we've seen all across New Mexico, northern New Mexico, the Gila as well as the Sacramento Mountains.

Ruidoso.

Same.

Same problem.

How dependent is New Mexico on that Colorado snowpack?

Yeah.

So our, the headwaters of the Rio Grande are up in Colorado.

So if you go to, like, if you take a vacation to Silverton, Colorado, and look up in the mountains up toward the high peaks, that's where the headwaters are.

And so we we measure a lot of our, snow water equivalent.

How much liquids in the in the snow and how most of it comes the majority of it comes in from the higher elevations, including Colorado.

So, and they're they're really struggling.

And if you look at statewide, we're also in the, the lowest we've been, we we've actually measured since we had sensors out.

So and we don't know before the sensors, but since we put sensors out, this is the low it's been.

How long ago was that?

So we've had some some of our sites have started in the 80s.

Okay.

1980s, 1980s.

Yeah.

Yeah 1980s.

We have to specify the 1900s now.

Exactly yeah.

So obviously, there was some factors that come together that affected our winter weather this year.

How can you characterize that?

So if you look at I mean, we've been we're in the midst of what we call mega drought.

So those are the droughts that are more than 20 to more than duration of 20 years.

And so if you look at even just shorter term, going back to 2020, if you and we key a lot of our snowpack on this, what they call tele-connection with the sea surface temperatures in the, in the, along the equator, going all the way to the date line to, Ecuador.

So that's if you look at the if you look at a map, kind of identify that area, we look at the sea surface temperatures in that area to kind of give us a sense of the, the patterns of weather in North America.

And so if you look at the last, you know, six years that most of the years, not all of the years, not all the months, actually, we look at every month.

They're the the sea surface temperature has been cooler than average.

So there's phases of the El Nino Southern Oscillation.

And so which one of them is El Nino?

Which is which we which we really want, which we don't have right now.

But those cooler than average, sea surface temperatures, those are the the La Nina signature, which is sort of a bad word in New Mexico because it usually yields, warmer than average mountain.

And this is wintertime, warm and dry.

for snowpack.

And we had three of those in a row, did we not?

Yeah.

Yeah.

And so if you look at the if you look at all the months since 2020 there, most of them you know, majority of them are cooler than average.

We've had we've had El Nino in there.

but it really wasn't as strong as the other ones.

And so we've had basically influence of like, you know, the several La ninas and really, really done a lot of damage to our, snowpack.

So let's talk about what the water situation will be as we move through the spring and the planting seeds and the growing season in southern New Mexico across the state.

Really?

Yeah.

Yeah.

So, you know, as part of what I do is we we do a monthly, meeting with, with our water managers and land managers across the state.

And, we've had we do them towards so toward the end of the, the end of the month.

Last month we had, folks from and from US Bureau of Reclamation talk and then a state engineer's office, and we, we look at all the reservoir storages all the way from northern New Mexico to southern New Mexico.

And basically it was showing that, you know, we we're pretty much, you know, that there's very little snow and an upper level, high elevations and most of it has already gone into reservoirs already.

And so there's very little water that's going to be transferred down to Elephant Butte, which is really sad.

You know, so we're going to they we're talking about areas along the Rio Grande they're going to be dry.

I mean, that's kind of we usually see that, but earlier, a much earlier than average, you know, seeing that and seeing that in the in the late spring as opposed to normally we see that like in June where we start to see drying of the riverbed.

But this is an early year for that.

And and there's we reaching peak of the reservoirs already.

And so where is Elephant Butte right now in terms of water level?

Yeah, I think it's I think it was around like 15%.

right around that, right around that level.

And that's pretty much I think if I remember what they're saying, that that's pretty much that's that's going to be the, the maximum amount.

And there's they're going to have to do deal with irrigation based off of a really low number.

Do you know what the lowest it has been?

It's not the lowest.

But what is the lowest?

Yeah I have to I would have to look back on exactly what year that was.

But it's, it's you know, we're in that, you know, like maybe the third, third, lowest year or, you know, there's there's been some really low years in the 50s, as well as recently we've had some really, because we've had not only the, the bad snowpack, but we also had really warm temperatures.

So those are they basically they're basically they combine efforts because you get a lot of evaporation.

You get drying of the the riverbeds, which, you know, basically the water comes down and infiltrates in and it gets, you know, it soaks in and which is good for the ecosystem, but it doesn't go down to our managed water systems, you know, like where we go, we store them in the, in the reservoirs.

So it's good for the system.

But you know, it's bad for irrigators.

And then of course we have to talk about litigation associated exactly with that.

So can you give us a little bit of what the landscape looks like right now regarding where water is regarding New Mexico and the courts?

Yeah, I'm not the right person to talk about the court actions.

But, you know, what I do is more of kind of, in the resilience part in kind of dealing with.

So how what kind of tools are there to and then basically give information to the people who actually make the, you know, how much water do they get?

What New Mexico, what do you think New Mexico agriculture is going to have to do in order to kind of meet the demand?

Right.

we we're there to remind folks, you know, this isn't something that's, it's going to heal in one year.

It's going to take many years of, of above average snowpack to, to basically recover from, you know, 20 years of, you know, lackluster snow and in some cases, even lackluster precipitation.

Like this year, snow is really bad, but the actual precipitation amount is near normal.

It's that it's below normal, but it's near.

So it's sort of a two faces of of drought, you know, no snow.

But we've had some rains in some of the areas which has helped actually in some of reservoirs as we're having this conversation, there's a chance of rain in our forecast.

Exactly.

So we wouldn't normally see this time.

We need to have more of these conversations so we have more rain.

Perhaps that's what did it.

Yeah, yeah.

Let's go back to last monsoon season and talk about how dismal that was.

Yeah.

So even before then the spring I mean last year was, was was horrendous in terms of the dryness, you know, especially the the southwestern part of the state was hit, hit the hardest.

We've had dust storms after dust storms.

The soil moisture was basically it was gone.

Basically everything that we had in the past, the previous spring and winter that it had all evaporated.

It was really warm.

And we, we came into summer with really dry soils.

So it's different than if we had, you know, even if we had an average, winter, it would have been a lot better.

But we, we came into the spring really dry and then so we had basically catch up, you know, even if we even if we get an average amount of precip in the summer, a lot of that is lost.

And I mean, it's good for, you know, infiltrating down for the trees and everything, but we started off on the wrong foot in the summer.

I mean, we've had some decent raises some places.

And the the people who won the most were like east, central New Mexico.

They've had some really good rain, San Miguel kind of all the way to the Texas Panhandle.

But then the southwest, the west side of the state really suffered.

And that's kind of the Gila, you know, where we've had historical fires there.

And and it went into, eastern Arizona as well.

And so southern Mexico is still catching up.

We got some good rains in January, but it's still still dry.

But it's we're actually doing better in the state than most most places.

Okay.

Down here in Las Cruces.

Well that's that's good.

That's good to know.

However, you mentioned fire season and it kind of felt this year like it just really never ended in a way.

There were no fires breaking out at times that we wouldn't normally see that.

So what do you think we're going to be seeing over the course of as the temperatures rise and we get into those really hot days of June, what fire season might look like?

Yeah.

So for fires, what I know, you have to have, lots of fuels.

So we have to have things to burn.

You have to have very dry, dry soils and dry conditions, very little rain and then winds, you know, you know, we've we've had those in the past, you know, we've had the Ruidoso fires.

That's all three of those we're in where we're building up to create that problem.

And and then we had flooding, you know, disasters flooding in July of last year.

so looking forward, you know, right now the the outlooks are showing, the models are showing.

So I'm, I'm cautiously optimistic.

They're showing a, a probability for above average precipitation starting down in the southwest corner of New Mexico and southeast Arizona.

That that's kind of our monsoon push as it goes forward at the sort of the end of June.

And then it actually is moves, moves northward and moves across the southern tier states, which is sort of was really good.

We need it has the El Nino pattern established for this year.

Well, it's it's tending that way.

So right now we just exited the La Nina and we're in the neutral territory so that the atmosphere is, is kind of resettling, you know, warming the ocean across the Pacific Ocean.

So it's finding a new state to settle in and which basically it takes a little bit of time when you get the ocean to, to change the temperatures, the atmosphere has to respond.

So there's a coupling between the winds, pressure storms and the ocean.

So that takes several months.

And what they predict right now with our climate models and that's what it's how we use it.

Predict the next season is a key off that.

And then they have they go forward and it's showing that the the winter for 2026, winter 26, 27 appears to be an El Nino, which is actually it actually is showing a fairly strong El Nino in terms of the, the, the warm ocean across the Pacific.

But it's hard to tell what the actual impacts are going to be to New Mexico yet.

So that's a big thing.

It's like, well, it may be a strong El Nino, but we don't know really yet.

You know, how much winter snow we're going to get because that's the big that's the item everyone wants to know right now.

I will keep my skis crossed.

Yeah.

For a great snow season.

Some of your work has been in air quality.

And those dust storms that we saw last year, record dust storms.

Oh, it's been it's been the most dust storm since the the Dust Bowl.

And I had Mike, my colleague down in UTEP, Tom Gill.

He's been keeping track of all the dust storms.

And he said, yep, that was the last time we had that number of dust storms.

Was it was back in the Dust Bowl and same, same here.

And that made our region the worst in air quality in the country.

Yeah, absolutely.

Yeah.

Because, you know, we measure particulate matter in two different sizes, PM10 and PM 2.5.

And both of them were I mean, the PM10 was off the charts in terms of how bad it was in and even impacted our transportation network, you know, closures of roads all over in Roswell as well as I-10 going across, into Arizona.

Such a deadly stretch of road.

Yeah.

And a lot of fatalities have resulted in that.

So when we last spoke, on the radio, our last conversation was for radio and we talked a little bit.

It was just on the heels of the cuts from the federal government and our National Weather Service and the scientific community as a whole.

And in the time since then, how have you seen those federal cuts impact the scientific work that you do and others do?

It's a good question.

you know, NOAA, that's the the the parent organization for a National Weather Service who gives us a forecast.

And we based a lot of our forecast on their organization.

They're going through a reorganization right now, and they don't even know what's going to happen.

They have sort of plans, but it's not like concrete and how that's going to pan out.

But they they do know the budgets, you know, in terms of how much money they have for staff and for things like observations, which are coupled together.

If you don't have a person there to do the observation, you can't do the observation basically, or you cut down on the observation.

And that's what's happened over the last year is, some of the long term observations that we rely on for, for climate and for just just for anything just to track how many freeze days for agricultural, you know, you know, when is the first frost or when's the last frost.

Those those are, those are the sites we use because they're like 50 years or more.

A lot of those may be cut because of the lack of funds and a lack of, a staff person to maintain those.

And that's obviously information that many people realize.

Oh, yes, yes.

I mean, even industry uses that data.

So it's impacting all parts of our economy as well as the forecasting.

Because of that, they've had National Weather Service has had to eliminate a lot of their balloon launches.

And those basically are used to help with the forecasting of the weather across the country.

So those we've lost and we've eliminated maybe a morning sounding that.

So basically release a balloon.

We call that a sounding in some of a, some areas of the country there, they eliminated them.

So let's talk about how, with ZiaMet how your networking and keeping up with things around the state.

Yeah.

So ZiaMet is our, new maisonette.

So that's our weather station network statewide.

We have, 215 stations across the state.

And they report data in real time every five minutes, and it's basically we, we support, the National Weather Service, any decision maker who uses data.

So emergency managers as well as of farming, ranching, we measure droughts by, by measuring precipitation temperature.

So that is one of our one of those things where it actually comes in a really good time when we're seeing the the federal networks are decreasing or being threatened, and then we're adding the statewide.

And that's kind of the I think in terms of looking at it from a big, big perspective in a national, I think that's kind of the is good, you know, that, you know, we're we're taking up the slack.

We don't want to see that happen.

But, you know, but we do have money.

We have support from our state legislators as well as NOAA itself to help with because if we were losing those and that's all we had, we would be really bad shape.

So ZiaMet is really taking the lead and and providing that.

And we've got a lot of stations that are out in the rural areas where they're not being covered right now.

A lot of our current weather stations that are real time are in, you know, towns and cities.

They have airports.

And so we're airports are you got people, but we're putting places in where there's maybe small communities or schools.

And so we're helping the communities.

Well, I can think of one community in particular, Silver City, where the Grant County Airport is quite a bit away.

And so very different temperatures and weather from Silver City proper.

Exactly, yeah.

And we got stations all up, the San Francisco River, you know, they help out with, you know, what's going on there.

And so some of the members of those communities that might be far away from airports can participate as citizen scientists and help the actual scientists do their work.

Right?

Yes.

So there's a really great program that I help manage, and it's called the Community Collaborative Rain, Hail and Snow Network and it's, abbreviated CoCoRaHS.

Co, Co, Ra, HS.

And what it is, we we basically we can get anybody enrolled.

Basically, it's just a measure of precipitation.

So rain, hail and snow and all we need is to get a little plastic gauge.

You can buy online.

And then put it in your front yard or backyard.

And then we've got online training for people.

And like I said, we've got observers elementary, elementary kids all the way to, you know, retirees, you know, to a 100 years old to participate in this and is basically a way to help out measuring drought and precipitation across New Mexico.

And we'll take observers anywhere.

If you're in a town or if you're way out in the sticks in a rural area, perfect.

We'll take you.

And basically that data goes to a national program.

And it's, and it's really easy to participate.

And, and actually this month, in April, we have, we call rain gauge rally.

And that's our main recruitment month.

And so this is a perfect time for, for you to join and, and become a member of CoCoRaHS And the website is cocorahs dot org.

Okay.

Co co ra hs dot org.

Exactly.

Very good.

Now, how important are those citizen scientists in terms of the big picture of information keeping?

Oh, really important because, you know, we've got you know, to know the spatial distribution of rain as well as the amounts is really important because, you know, rain doesn't fall the same everywhere.

So if you were to just have measurements that even ZiaMet, you know, ZiaMet are finding places and there's big gaps between them.

But if we have, you know, community members across neighborhoods, we're not going to miss the rain because we know I like where I am in Las Cruces.

My my neighbor measures rain.

So we have a competition who measures the most rain.

And we actually do measure different amounts surprisingly.

It's just, you know, just a few hundred feet away.

And so, I mean, if you're here in the summer, you can see the columns of rain.

And sometimes here's the haves and haves and the have nots and over, you know, the whole season it kind of averages out.

But, but on a, on a storm, a storm basis, we can get big just, you know, an inch or more difference from one end of the town and the other.

Or especially if we're just measuring precip at the airport, it may not be raining there, but it's raining in your house and vice versa, you know?

So we really need those citizen science observers to help fill in the gaps.

All right, well, before I let you go, I know there's some, Earth Month activities on the way that, are going to be happening at Young Park on, Earth Day, April 18th.

Yes, absolutely.

Thanks for bringing that up, because we're, we're really excited to, to have, and it's mainly an afternoon event and afternoon evening where we have, concerts, we have, performers as well as, information tables.

A lot of our faculty are, you know, bringing their, their research, entomology, you know, etc.

they're bringing art and bringing their, their information out there and it's going to be a fun time.

I think there's going to be food out there.

So, you know, April 18th, Young Park come out there with your family and have fun.

And learn how to take action in your own life to help Mother Earth.

I guess.

Exactly.

Yeah.

Yeah.

Well, state climatologist Doctor David DuBois, thank you so much for joining us.

It's been a very enlightening conversation.

We appreciate your time.

My pleasure.

Yeah.

And full moon programs get underway May 1st with the flower moon at White Sands National Park.

May has two full moons.

The blue moon is May 31st.

KRWG Public media senior TV producer Courtney Hill takes us to a full moon night with Native American flutist Randy Granger.

And.

Other.

You can find more information on White Sands Full Moon Nights at nps dot gov.

Thank you for watching Fronteras A Changing America.

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