Study Shows Snowmelt Now Peaks Two Weeks Earlier In Montana Than 1950s

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"Evidence collected over the last 50 years suggests that rising temperatures have fostered a decline in springtime snowpack of 15 to 30 percent in Montana and that springtime peak river flows now come an average of two weeks earlier, he said.

The snowpack, which holds about 75 percent of the West's water supply, acts as a reservoir that keeps streams flowing in the summer months. If the melt continues to recede earlier into spring, resulting summer water shortages could affect everything from agriculture and hydropower to fish habitat, the professor (ed. - University of Montana Dr. Steve Running) said.

It's a fear that he shares with Belgrade native Kelly Redmond, Western regional climatologist for the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration Climate Center in Reno, Nev. The degree of change in spring melt varies, Redmond said, but the trend toward earlier melt is widespread across the West. Yellowstone Basin snow begins to melt five to 15 days earlier than it did 56 years ago.

The trend becomes more pronounced as waters flow west. West of the Divide in Montana and into Idaho, Washington and Oregon, spring melt comes 15 to 25 days earlier, Redmond said. "It's kind of taken us all aback,'' he said in a telephone interview. "It's kind of hard to see this happening right under our nose without us noticing.''

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