No Snow This Winter, Drought Later In The Year? [AUDIO]

No snow in much of New Jersey this winter at a time when we can usually count on the white stuff to cover lawns and sidewalks. But will the water supply come up short later this year because of the sparse snowfall?

Dave Robinson, the State Climatologist at Rutgers, says while it’s true snowfall has been almost non-existent this winter, the later part of 2011 was very wet, most notably August and September, when Irene and Lee flooded New Jersey. But Robinson adds it never hurts to keep an eye on things. He says we can slip from plenty of water into drought pretty quickly in New Jersey. Robinson says that usually does not occur in the winter. It is in the summer when we have those kind of worries.

Robinson says typically, the vast majority of New jersey’s winter precipitation will turn up rain and not snow.

He says there is some concern about the lack of a snow pack in the Catskills, which feeds reservoirs that supply the Delaware River.

He says February has been dry. It follows two months of average rainfall in January and December.