For those of you who wish to keep an eye on things, the National Weather Service has graphics displaying current and forecast river levels available online.
If necessary, scroll down the page a little ways to see the North Fork data. There are three automated gauges on the North Fork Flathead: at the Canadian border, at Polebridge and at Columbia Falls. With exceptionally bad timing, the gauge at Polebridge is down right now, but presumably will be fixed fairly soon.
A warming trend later this week is expected to increase snowpack runoff and likely cause small stream flooding by Friday.
The Daily Inter Lake has the story . . .
The National Weather Service expects mountain snowpack to begin melting at a more rapid rate beginning Wednesday and extending through Friday, according to a weather outlook released Saturday afternoon.
A ridge of high pressure is forecast to bring warmer air to the Northern Rockies, increasing the likelihood that small streams and creeks will spill out of their banks by Friday.
The warmer weather system is expected to come on the heels of persistent rain and snowfall today and Monday at elevations above 6,000 feet, where snow levels are already well above historic averages.
Among several other items, the Montana Fish, Wildlife and Parks Commission will consider tentative fall wolf hunting season quotas and dates at their meeting this month. The meeting is on May 12 at the FWP Helena office, 1420 East 6th Ave. beginning at 8:30 a.m.
According to the FWP, the “tentative proposals will be similar to those adopted before a federal court halted the state’s 2010 hunting season, with the exception of a statewide quota of 220 up from 186 proposed last year, and the addition of a wolf management unit in the Bitterroot area south of Missoula. Assuming tentative adoption, the public will be asked to comment through June 20. The FWP Commission is expected to take final action at its July 14 meeting.”
Related links . . .
Montana FWP Commission home page
This article from the Missoulian points out that, even though wolf management has been returned to state level in Montana and Idaho, the federal government will still be shoulder-surfing actions by state management agencies.
Thursday’s announcement that gray wolves are back under state management in Montana and Idaho also included a warning: The federal government is watching.
“We will continue monitoring gray wolves to ensure those populations remain robust,” Deputy Secretary of the Interior David Hayes said during a news conference call. “We will continue to follow the Endangered Species Act in Montana and Idaho.”
That was welcome news to the Montana Department of Fish, Wildlife and Parks. Agency spokesman Ron Aasheim said the department’s wolf management program was closely linked to support from the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service.
In this week’s conference call, the National Weather Service continues to fret about the potential for flooding . . .
It may not be as soggy as the spring of 1997, but this year has potential for record floods in western Montana and the Idaho Panhandle.
“When we get those warmer temperatures next week, we’ll see those rivers start to react,” National Weather Service hydrologist Ray Nickless said on a Thursday conference call. “We’ll be seeing high water all the way through May and into June.”
Many parts of the northern Rocky Mountains have record-high snowpacks, and the ones that don’t nevertheless have kept the snow much longer than usual…
Glacier Park is having trouble getting dug out this year . . .
Due to an unusually large, lingering snowpack and cool temperatures, Glacier National Park officials announced delays in opening some east side campgrounds and the Swiftcurrent Motor Inn. The opening date of the Many Glacier, Cutbank and Two Medicine Campgrounds will be June 10th, instead of the usual Memorial Day Weekend opening date. The Swiftcurrent Motor Inn opening will also be delayed until June 10th rather than the previously anticipated June 3rd. Visitors with reservations at Swiftcurrent Motor Inn will be accommodated at other Glacier Park, Inc. properties. Park crews are working diligently to get facilities uncovered, water and wastewater services turned on, utilities repaired and roads dug out.
Although May has shown some signs of spring, weather stations at West Glacier, East Glacier and Saint Mary all recorded near record or record precipitation amounts for April. US Geological Survey snow surveys measured 88 inches of snow on the ground at the 5,900 foot level near Siyeh Bend on the Going-to-the-Sun Road (Sun Road) in the end of March. The survey was repeated a month later and 106 inches of snow was measured at the same location. Snow depth data has been collected since 1993, and the highest recorded depth was 166 inches at the 7,000 foot level in the end of April 2011.
Glacier Park just posted this year’s campground schedule. Locally, the Bowman and Kintla Lake campgrounds open May 27; Logging doesn’t open until July 1.
See the press release for the full schedule, usage fees and other details.
Here’s a short Associated Press article covering both of the two lawsuits filed today opposing congressional removal of gray wolves from Endangered Species Act protection . . .
Environmental groups asked a federal judge Thursday to put gray wolves back on the endangered species list in the Northern Rockies.
Two lawsuits were filed in federal court in Montana as control over more than 1,300 wolves was turned over to state authorities in Montana, Idaho, Oregon, Washington and Utah.
A federal budget bill rider in April had mandated Thursday’s lifting of wolf protections.
As expected, a number of environmental groups filed suit in federal court today challenging congressional removal of gray wolves from Endangered Species Act protection. Here is the Missoulian’s write-up on one of the two suits . . .
A trio of wolf advocates claim Congress violated the Separation of Powers Doctrine when it removed gray wolves from Endangered Species Act protection and blocked future court review.
“We will not allow the fate of endangered species to be determined by politicians serving special interests,” Alliance for the Wild Rockies director Michael Garrity said in an email Thursday morning. “These decisions must be based on science, not politics, and Congress has never before removed species from the endangered species list by political fiat.”
AWR was joined by Friends of the Clearwater and WildEarth Guardians in the suit, filed in U.S. District Court in Missoula.
As of yesterday, wolf managment has been returned to state control in Montana and Idaho. Here is the Daily Inter Lake’s take on the subject . . .
The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service issued a final rule Wednesday that officially removes wolves in Montana and Idaho from the Endangered Species list.
The rule comes on the heels of Congressional action that compelled delisting.
“We are implementing the recent legislation that directs the delisting of the gray wolf in most of the northern Rocky Mountains,” Interior Deputy Secretary David Hayes said in a prepared statement. “As with other delisted species, we will be applying the Endangered Species Act’s post-delisting monitoring requirements to ensure that wolf populations remain robust while under state wildlife management.”