Water managers fear not having enough water for irrigation needs

By Kate Ramsayer / The Bulletin

Rocks and logs appeared in stretches of the Upper Deschutes River, and Mirror Pond started looking more like a mud flat, as water managers have dialed down the flow of the river for the winter.

Flows are at some of the lowest levels in years below Wickiup Dam because managers attempt to save up as much as possible in Wickiup Reservoir and Crane Prairie Reservoir in preparation for next summer’s irrigation season.

“The outflow out of Wickiup is cut back to the minimum. ... We were not confident that we could fill both those reservoirs by releasing more than the minimum,” said Kyle Gorman, region manager for the South Central region of the Oregon Water Resources Department.

While there is no actual set minimum at Wickiup Reservoir, the releases don’t get lower than they have been recently. Earlier this week, the flow of water entering the Upper Deschutes from Wickiup Dam was 22 cubic feet per second — about one-eighth of the average flow for this time of year. The last time a similar amount was released from Wickiup was in 2006, Gorman said, when water managers released about 30 cubic feet per second.

This year, the water managers are storing as much water as possible behind the dam because of a number of factors, he said. Last winter was relatively dry, so there wasn’t as much natural flow in the Deschutes River this summer. Because of this, irrigators had to rely more on the water stored in Wickiup Reservoir this summer, Gorman said.