We have had one hell of a winter this year!  Lots of snow!  Lots of wind!  Lots of grey skies.  I can say definitively that I am no longer a fan of the color grey.  I think I would prefer plaid or mauve at this point.

Many of you have been reading into my emails about lake level that I’m really trying to get the boats out of the parking lot.  You are reading that right.  We really need to open the parking lot back up for repairs and to just make room for all the parking traffic that is demanded from us during the summer.  It was never intended that the parking lot would be long term storage.  It was always intended as short-term storage as we waited to see what happened to lake levels.

So, when making the decision of what to do with your boats in the parking lot, here is where we are now.  The mouth of the marina is just over 5 feet deep.  There is a strong desire to do some dredging this spring that will also make the mouth wider and deeper.  I will give more details about that as it becomes available.

As I stated earlier, we have had an incredible winter.  Here are some numbers as of today: (understand that GSL gets half of its water from Direct Precipitation and half of its water from Spring Runoff)

Precipitation of Normal for the water year (starting October) 139%  Big number!

Precipitation of Normal since January 1 = 169%  EVEN BIGGER NUMBER!

Precipitation for October:  125%  Big number

November: 124%  Big number

December:  60%  Not exciting but not detrimental.

January:  93%  About normal

February:  262%  VERY VERY VERY BIG NUMBER!

And we have had a great start for March.

So much for the Direct Precipitation side.  Now lets look at Snowpack.  As of today we are at 129%  BIG NUMBER with Bear River being at 129%  This is very important as 60% of our runoff comes from the Bear River.

Now lets look at another important number.  It’s called the Tea-Cup number.  This is the percentage of water in the reservoirs that drain into the Great Salt Lake.

Bear Lake is nearly full.  That means The Bear River is coming our way this spring.

Pineview, Causey, Lost Creek, Echo And Rockport are all in the mid 70% to mid 80% full number.

Jordanelle is at 82%

Deer Creek is 97%

Willard Bay is 88%

Utah Lake is 103% and they are dumping Utah Lake into Great Salt Lake as fast as they can.

This means that the snowpack is COMING OUR WAY!  It isn’t going to be held back for the reservoirs.

The lake bottomed out at 4192.2’ msl in October 2023.  We are sitting at 4193.9’ msl today.  That is 1.7’ rise already.  And runoff has just BARELY started.

Now back to that depth in the mouth of the marina of just over 5 feet.  We are going to likely get AT LEAST another 3 feet (maybe even more) of lake rise before we start to drop by evaporation this early summer.  And we are likely to only drop 1.5 to 1.7’  This would mean two banner winters and lake rise years.  It is VERY likely that, if you put your boat in the water this year, you will be able to sail year round.

There are some great activities planned this year including Great Salt Lake Community OPENINING DAY the first Saturday of May and also the Eardley Spit Cruise in early June.  I have also heard that Great Salt Lake Row and Great Salt Lake Yacht Club are planning some great activities this year.

There is a Crane Day still planned for March 26 or close to that date.  If you are planning on craning in but aren’t on the list now please get on there.

It is looking like a great year or two at minimum to really get out there and enjoy the lake.  Please do so.

Dave