An unusually warm spring has encouraged the mountains to lose their snowpack a little earlier than usual, but water officials believe irrigators and residents will still have plenty of water this summer.

The mountain water levels, measured at automated stations in the San Juan Mountains, dropped from 98 percent of average on April 3 to only 48 percent of average on May 1, according to John Porter, general manager of the Dolores Water Conservancy District.

Two of the automated sites — Lone Cone and Scotch Creek — are completely dry, Porter said.

The Dolores River below McPhee Reservoir, which had never seen a flow above 1,200 cubic feet per second during the month of April, swelled to 2,021 cubic feet per second on Friday, but was slowed by cloudy skies to 1,881 cfs on Saturday and 1,548 cfs on Sunday, Porter said.

The Dolores River will stay safely within its banks until water flows reach more than 4,000 cfs, Porter said.

The runoff is helping to fill McPhee, which still needs 22,000 acre-feet — or five feet of elevation — before it is completely full.

Porter said that while the river’s flow rate below the dam is controlled by releases from the dam, some of the flow in the river upstream of the dam is determined by the mountain runoff. Flows above the dam may drop as low as 100 cubic feet per second, depending on the amount of rain that falls this summer, Porter said.

"They release water from Groundhog Reservoir, so anything up there is OK, but the only concern is on the East Fork, because it doesn’t have any water storage upstream," Porter said.

"That’s only gone dry once in recorded history."

Porter said that while the early spring runoff has meant a wild ride for many rafters and kayakers, future flows could be slower than initially predicted.

"We have told the rafting community that there will be rafting releases through the sixth of June, and I don’t see that changing, but it may not be as high as we had thought earlier," he said.

Porter said that while the automated sites help to monitor moisture levels during the winter, their accuracy drops significiantly during the late spring.

"I never worry too much about it after the first of May, because then we’re in the runoff season and the (automated stations) aren’t as accurate in telling what’s going to happen," he said.

Porter said that McPhee Reservoir allows water officials to better manage the unpredictable snowmelt.