Bishop Creek Lakes Show Historic Shorelines

These are Lake Sabrina and South Lake in the Bishop Creek Basin of the Southern Sierra Nevada Mountains; they are at an historic low.  The light areas around the lake shores are usually under water.  This is a rare sight of the historic shorelines, the way they used to look before they were damned for power by Southern California Edison.  Lake Sabrina’s dam has been in existence since 1908 (Wikipedia).





Lake Sabrina, Sierra Nevada Mountains - Historic Shoreline




South Lake, Sierra Nevada Mountains - Historic Shoreline

Years of drought have taken their toll on the watersheds that feed these lakes, as it has elsewhere. Generally, melting snow fields create runoff in the early summer, and then later melting ice takes over.  But with many years of drought, the ice has not been replenished...and it’s going away.  If we don’t get substantial precipitation over the next few years to reload the ice packs, we may see the lowest runoff in human memory.