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Show By GARY R, BLODGETT LAYTON - "At least we're off to a pretty good start." THAT WAS the comment of Wayne M. Winegar, district manager for Weber Basin Water Conservancy District, after a survey of reservoirs which supply communities along the Wasatch Front from Willard, Box Elder County to North Salt Lake. "Compared to last year when drought conditions almost al-most draineu our carryover water supply, this year's water picture could be termed very bright," " said Mr. Winegar. HE NOTED that the irrigation irriga-tion season is over and water was to have been turned off throughout the system this week, 'There is little question but what our water supply will be adequate for next year unless we have a complete drought this winter," said the usually conservative district manager. JIMMY KOSTOFF, chief engineer for the district, said the seven reservoirs serving the district have nearly 175,000 acre-feet more in them than they did a year ago at this time. "We are just amazed when we see the carryover in the reservoirs this year," he said. "Last year, it was a pitiful state with the reservoirs drained almost dry." HE NOTED that Willard Bay Reservoir is holding the bulk of the district's carryover water supply a total of 165,000 acre-feet compared com-pared to only 99,000 acre-feet last year at the end of September. Sep-tember. In his report to district officials, of-ficials, Mr. Kostoff gave this comparison of the water stored in the seven reservoirs as of Sept. 30: PINE VIEW, 71,160 acre-feet acre-feet compared to only 33,920; Causey Creek, 1,928 acre-feet compared to 1,037; Willard Bay, 165,500 acre-feet compared com-pared to 98,980; Echo, 34,780 acre-feet compared to 21,350; East Canyon, 31, 120 acre-feet compared to 15,830; Rock Port, 52,500 acre-feet compared com-pared to 18,980; and Lost Creek. 14,600 acre-feet compared com-pared to 8,500 a year ago. Mr. Kostoff said it is commendable com-mendable that the district has such a high water carryover despite a hotter and drier summer than usual. "THE WASATCH Front went three months without any measurable precipitation with only a couple of good storms in September breaking that dry spell," he said. "In fact, last summer was drier than the drought summer of the year before and the temperatures were generally higher." But despite the dry spell, the district pumped only 1,000 acre-feet of water from one well this year to meet peak demands compared to 12,000 acre-feet pumped from all eight district wells the year before. . ANOTHER GOOD indication indica-tion of the water year just passed is that late spring runoff from watersheds met customer demands during the early season and it was not until July 2 that the first water was released from the storage reservoirs, Mr. Kostoff Kos-toff noted. 'That was one of the latest dates in history for users to start drawing water from the storage reservoirs," he said. MR. WINEGAR praised the water users for their conservative conser-vative efforts to save water. "It seems that their conservation con-servation practices from the previous year carried over to this year and water usage was down in several areas despite thelongdryspell,"hesaid. "It really pleases me when I see canals shut down when there are storms. This goes a long way to conserving water." HE NOTED that some 40,000 water users depend on either culinary or irrigation water, or both, from the district. dis-trict. Weber Basin Water Conservancy District has been in operation nearly 20 years. |