The severe drought is drying up the Carson River. | Mark Fetzer/Flickr
The severe drought is drying up the Carson River. | Mark Fetzer/Flickr
Severe drought has left the Carson River with fewer fish, and mountains that were once capped with snow, now bare, the Associated Press reported.
"This is the worst I’ve seen," Devere Dressler, a sixth generation rancher, told AP. "I’ve never seen snow go away.”
The drought has forced Dressler to reduce the size of his cattle herd by a third and allowed some of his 1,200 acres to go dry to conserve water from the river.
Unlike the Truckee River, the Carson River doesn't have a lot of water stored in reservoirs upstream, the story said.
Low water levels and poor pasture conditions have prompted some ranchers to stop using federal grazing areas, Chris Moreno, a Nevada Department of Agriculture environmental scientist, told AP.
“Folks are just selling off whatever (livestock) they can because they can’t afford feed,” Moreno said.
Lake Lahontan, fed by the Carson River, now resembles a bed of dry, cracked mud and sand, AP reported. Usually 60-feet deep, it's now just a small pool of water, the story said.
The reservoir also takes in water from the Truckee River and is largest storage area on the Carson River, AP said.
“If we have another dry year next year,” Carson Water Subconservancy District General Manager Ed James told AP, "it’s going to be really ugly.”
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