El Niño impacts on Washington agriculture

Ready for that El Nino winter, and that means next few months are expected to be drier and warmer than average, which might sound nice, but parts of the state are already into the middle of a drought, which is not ideal for our Washington farmers. And this morning we are joined by Jacqueline Hanock, a water resources scientist with the Washington Department of Agriculture, to learn more about how this winter could impact the drought that we're already in. So good morning, Jacqueline. Good morning, Brian. Okay, so who does a drought impact the most here across the state? Every drought event is different, but drought is a significant challenge for agriculture. When we have less than normal water supply, that means that we could have reduced or interrupted water supply for irrigators. That causes challenges and impacts to our crop yields and our crop qualities. And this year we're facing, in 2026, the fourth drought year in a row in the Yakima Basin. And these multi-year droughts can have confounding impacts for agriculture where you might be dealing with impacts from the previous year's drought and the current year's drought at the same time. What do farmers out there do when they're in a drought or when they've been dealing with it for years? Do they figure out a way to water their crops or they just have to go without doing it? Our farmers in Washington are incredibly resilient, but the reality is that they do need water. All the crops that we grow in Washington need water. There are practices that we do see incredible adaptability of our producers, and that's ongoing. There's adaptive water management in a lot of the basins that we see some of the more For significant impacts like the Yakima Basin. And then there's conservation practices and resources at the more local scale that's available to help producers prepare for these impacts. Now, this upcoming winter, we're going to be in what's called a super El Nino, which means the ocean waters are even warmer than a normal El Nino winter. And, you know, with not having many of those right now, it looks like up in the mountains, we potentially could see a decent amount of snow, but up high, maybe not down low below that. Say 4,000 foot level, so how is snow important for farming and for everything as opposed to just hitting the slopes for skiing and snowboarding? Right. Yeah. I mean, a healthy water supply relies on snowpack in our mountains in Washington State. And so what we need for the water supply for agriculture and all other water users is to have that snowpack kind of gradually melt, fill our streams and our canals. And when we have warmer than normal conditions, that means, as you've stated, a lot of our precipitation could fall As rain rather than snow. And we need that snowpack, it essentially acts as an additional reservoir to help the timing and have later season water in our streams. So we are watching snowpack closely this year and every year to try to get a pulse on whether or not that's gonna be a factor that impacts next year's irrigation season. So how much water do Washington farmers use? I know every crop's different, It depends on how much land they have as well, but on average, how much water do Washington farmers use and what's an ideal reserve? Where do we currently stand with all that? You know, that's a great question. And I can't speculate on the exact number. You know, there are things that go on in agriculture, like crop rotations, where there's different crops grown one year than another year, and also changing in market patterns as far as, you know, some crops moving in or out of the spotlight. So I don't have an exact number on the quantity of water, but agriculture is a significant water user. And so we're relying not only on the snowpack, but the storage in our reservoirs that serve our major irrigation systems, like in the Yakima and the Columbia Basin. Thank you. And so we're early in the water year now. You know, the water year restarts in October. And so ideally, we'll see those water resources kind of replenish and prepare us for the 2027 growing season. All right, Jacqueline Hancock with the Washington Department of Agriculture. Thank you so much for taking the time to talk with us today. Thank you for having me, Brian.