6/22 BV: Good to go for 10-15 days

6/22 Update:
Sorry this didn't come sooner! Paul said there was no way to know what flows were going to do last weekend or how to predict future flows because the River Commissioner didn't have the numbers to make a decision. He said the RC finally made a decision on flows yesterday once they had snow pack and reservoir level calculations complete. The race had low flows because of mother nature's indecision and the calculations not being done.

The good news (late as it may be) is that BV will have at least 900-1100 cfs for 10-15 days. Paul said his gut feeling is that it will go higher and probably max out again around 1400-1500 cfs, but he won't know until this next Monday. The weather has been so irregular for this time of year it has been hard to predict what flows will be.

He also said Jordanelle needs to drop by 5 feet from its current level, but is gaining 1.5 feet a day. In essence, there will be a lot of water for awhile being pushed through BV.

He also said the spill way at Deer Creek is being used which means that the flows may be higher than reported on the CUWCD gauge.

***As a side note I got to meet Frederick the Beaver in person on Monday. He was hanging out just downstream from his lodge on the bank eating some grass and he was HUGE. His head is bigger than a softball and his body bigger than a basketball. Super chunky beaver ftw.

5/24 Update:
Need to make some corrections after flows today and another conversation with Paul.

First off…

-These flows are absolutely a blast! If you listen close you can hear the rocks on the river
bottom slamming and crashing together. The ultra rare Gigantus Logus is migrating and can occasionally be seen catching a surf, so heads up. There are plenty of fun surf spots and
big waves to mess around on.

Now for the business…

-River is fluctuating between 1400-1500 cfs and is now at its capacity. The previously mentioned
capacity of 1800 cfs is for the river below the powerplant diversion not for the Bridal Veil section.

-This fluctuating 1400-1500 cfs will last for sure until FRIDAY at which point the water manager said it would go down 100 or 200 cfs. The bump in flows is essentially a test to
see how the river system from Deer Creek down to Utah lake will handle max
flows. Definitely crossing fingers we will get more of these flows in the next few weeks.



5/23 Update:
I spoke with Paul the Provo River Area Manager this afternoon. Lots of good news through June for BV.
THE JIST: Water is up. Water is going to keep going up. Get it while it's good!

-100 cfs was added in this afternoon to put flows a little above 1300 cfs.

-100 cfs will be added tomorrow at 7am to bring flows a little above 1400 cfs.

-All of the water being released into BV is due to Deer Creek reservoir "maintenance" or in other words the water being too high. The reservoir needs to go down 56 inches still before they will start decreasing flows again. This translates into almost a month of present flows and doesn't count how much the reservoir water level will go up with additional run off or any of the water that will be pushed down from Jordanelle in the coming weeks.

-Flow capacity for the river channel we call Bridal Veil is estimated at about 1800 cfs. We should see peak flows in this range sometime in the first couple of weeks in June if forecasting is correct.

-Going to be a long watery boating season on BV. Come and get some


Original Post 4/5/11:

This is not intended to be a response to Johnnie's joking post as I already had this information prior to reading his post. Just fyi.

I spoke with Paul the Provo River Area Manager this morning. He is responsible for a large portion of the Provo river system and is the guy that essentially approves all the flows through Bridal Veil reach. Here is the info I gathered from him.

Good news:
-By 11:00 am on Tuesday April 5th, 2011 there will be an additional 100 cfs in the river bringing it back up to around 300-350 cfs.

-By Noon on Wednesday April 6th, 2011 there will be another 100 cfs added in. This should bring flows near or over 400-450 cfs and maybe even a bit higher.

-There will be other irrigation releases like this periodically, but as of yet he couldn't give me a detailed schedule. He said that water season officially begins April 15th as per the River commissioner. So we can expect more steady flows in BV from April 15th on.

-The June Sucker Release has been requested already and they asked for peak flows. Somewhere around 1500 cfs is what he said to expect. The dates are still iffy, but he said it will be the same as every other year so likely mid-May.

A few other things he mentioned:
-The BV gauge is not a gauge but a flow calculation based on other
gauges sites. The calculation is currently messed up because of the
maintenance happening at Murdock dam (the BV takeout). When the
maintenance is done and the diversion is refilled the flow reading at
CUWCD.com will be correct again. This should happen no later than April
15th.

-The max capacity of the pipeline that takes the water away from BV is 450 cfs. Anything over that amount will go directly into the BV run.

-The flows listed on the CUWCD site for BV and for Deer creek dam down to the Olmstead diversion (BV put in) are not always correct during high runoff years because when the Deer Creek dam spillway is opened the flows are not measured or accounted for. As an example he said if the gauge is reading 900 and the spillway is open it might actually be 1200 cfs running through the canyon. So in essence he was saying be careful of just trusting the gauge.

-We already knew this, but he said it is a high water year because of a large snowpack and that we should have plenty of water to paddle in Provo until about July 1st.


Anyone want to boat tomorrow?

Thanks AJ! You rock. If the "grizzled beaver named fredric" said 1500 cfs that would be SWEET! That amount of water is very fun!

Great news! Thanks for the post. Time to dust the cob webs out and put on my skirt.

Water manager was right two days in a row. Looking forward to BV going big this year. I will post a schedule if I can ever get one from him.

For those who are interested...

Today Dan and I talked to the water manager at the put in today. Running at 437 cfs now and 200 more coming next Wednesday.

Cool, thanks for the info!

Let me know at the we are adding 500cfs point, and I'll definitely make it priority one.

1 grand would be very nice

That sounds sweet. Note that we have a grand in the Ogden still, and there are IVish sections above and below the Narrows right now, that are little-travelled..

edit: the Ogden is fantastic right now! So few boaters; come on out!
Rainbow Gardens is rather big water class III (some 4 foot waves), right in our back yard! River left new wood was removed above the Dino park. Obvious wood in center-right remains.
Pineview is similar to BV; really excellent. Those low wires behind Alaskan Inn have been removed.
89 to Riverdale is actual big water class III. It is super fun; moves fast through the flats; about an hour run @3300; and now its higher! (3,780). Has some good surf.
Riverdale to 24th is not a beginner run right now, because of a mandatory bridge roll, and a should/must-make move left above wood soon after. I don't really recommend this section, since theres no big rapids other than 24th street, which is an exciting finish actually. 1st hole punches center-left, 2nd wave is a good catch-on-the-fly surf. 3rd wave is a wave train.

Bump... Check the first post.

Bump first post edited again...

many, many thanks for the beta, a.j. gigantus logus made my heart crap its pants this morning as i was the first boater to come upon it... holy cow!!!

Hahaha! I had the same feeling followed by frantic waving to all the boaters behind me to go the other way. None of which knew why I was waving my arms and paddle in the air like an idiot until they turned the bend. Christian did get a solid log grind on it that looked sweet.

mitch and fat newty thought my arm waving was my feeble attempt at getting on an mtv reality show about ex-cheerleaders w/ a serious meth problem...

good times, brother faust!!!

johnnie and the elders gladly call you one of their own. not too sure that's a desirable endorsement...

did i miss the high flows?

afaust wrote:None of which knew why I was waving my arms and paddle in the air like an idiot until they turned the bend.

Might be a good time for a reminder to talk to each other before a run (if you're paddling with different people than normal) about signals and such.

@Justin: hopefully there will be more opportunity with the June sucker release still and a LOT of water still in jordanelle, the snowpack and Deer Creek. Water is still up around 1250 anyway.

@Jeff: great idea

Bump for update on the first post.

Watery goodness incoming.

This post is confusing in some ways. Better to start a new one for updated info. That said, thanks very much for the great info!

Good point Brighton. If I end up doing another update I will start a new thread. For now here is the info in case someone is interested.

6/22 Update:
Sorry this
didn't come sooner! Paul said there was no way to know what flows were
going to do last weekend or how to predict future flows because the
River Commissioner didn't have the numbers to make a decision. He said
the RC finally made a decision on flows yesterday once they had snow
pack and reservoir level calculations complete. The race had low flows
because of mother nature's indecision and the calculations not being
done.

The good news (late as it may be) is that BV will have at
least 900-1100 cfs for 10-15 days. Paul said his gut feeling is that it
will go higher and probably max out again around 1400-1500 cfs, but he
won't know until this next Monday. The weather has been so irregular for
this time of year it has been hard to predict what flows will be.

He also said Jordanelle needs to drop by 5 feet from its current level, but is gaining 1.5 feet a day. In essence, there will be a lot of water for awhile being pushed through BV.

He
also said the spill way at Deer Creek is being used which means that
the flows may be higher than reported on the CUWCD gauge.

***As a
side note I got to meet Frederick the Beaver in person on Monday. He
was hanging out just downstream from his lodge on the bank eating some
grass and he was HUGE. His head is bigger than a softball and his body
bigger than a basketball. Super chunky beaver ftw.