Are more mostly dry months ahead for California?

OAKLAND, Calif. - As we enter the critical rainy months of December through March, we find ourselves in two unusual and conflicting situations: lack of water and an abundance of it. 

So far this rainy season, the Department of Water Resources says California’s water year is off to a relatively dry start with October and November. 

"Now we've seen, so far through the fall, a pretty dry year; only half of the precip we would expect by now," said state climatologist Michael Anderson.

UC Merced's Center of Watershed Sciences expert agrees.

"Average snow water content is much lower. Precipitation is much lower than average for this time of the year, so that's where we are," Josue Medellin-Azuara said.

Last week, the department announced that its customers who serve 27 million Californians, will get only ten percent of their water rights. The department further says it is hopeful that this El Niño pattern will generate wet weather, but it may not.

"When we look at the outcomes of the seven events of the 21st century, they've been all over the board. We've had two dry years, two wet years and three near-average years," said Anderson. 

Julie Kalansky, PhD of the Scripps Institute of Oceanography at UC San Diego said "For the southern portion of California, historically, it has generally meant that there have not been dry years. The relationship between El Niño and northern California is not very consistent and there's a lot of variability from year to year."

"We find ourselves in a rather unique position here for the 21st century in that we're above average in our reservoir storage for this time of year," said climatologist Anderson.

The good news is, as of Tuesday midnight, California's six largest mega reservoirs are sitting at almost 67% of their capacity; almost 120% of their historical capacity on Dec. 5. 

Exactly one year earlier, with no promise or inkling of an end to the long drought, those same reservoirs were at just 30% of capacity and only 52% of their historical average; less than half of now. On top of that, there's enough extra water to inject the equivalent of Lake Oroville's huge capacity for underground storage.  

Having said all that now is no time to start surging our water supply, because we simply do not know what the next three to three-and-a-half months will bring in terms of water. 

But the good news is, in the winter months, both residents and agriculture, tend to use a lot less water, counting on Mother Nature.