Idaho snowpack (SNOTEL)
Idaho statewide snow water equivalent on 1 April each year, as a percent of the 1991-2020 median, computed from every active NRCS SNOTEL station in Idaho.
Publisher
- Organization
- USDA Natural Resources Conservation Service
- Publisher’s dataset
- SNOTEL: 1 April Snow Water Equivalent, Percent of Median
- File or API used
- https://wcc.sc.egov.usda.gov/awdbRestApi/services/v1/data
- Retrieval script
scripts/fetch-nrcs-snowpack.py- Methodology
- https://wcc.sc.egov.usda.gov/reports/UpdateReport.html?report=Idaho
Coverage
- Geography
- Idaho, statewide
- Time coverage
- 1981-2026
- Update frequency
- Annual
- Published
- not stated
- Retrieved
- September 8, 2026
- License
- The compiled file on this page is CC BY 4.0. The underlying records: Public domain. U.S. federal government work.
Measures
| Measure | What it measures | Unit |
|---|---|---|
| Snow water equivalent, percent of median | 1 April snow water equivalent as a percent of the 1991-2020 median, aggregated statewide across active SNOTEL stations. | percent |
Caveats
- This is a statewide figure, not a per-basin one: NRCS publishes a live per-basin index in its Idaho SNOTEL Snowpack Update Report, but that report only serves the current day and its station-to-basin grouping is not exposed in the AWDB REST API, so a trustworthy historical per-basin series could not be built. This value instead applies NRCS's own documented basin-index formula statewide: the sum of each station's 1 April reading divided by the sum of each station's median for that day, times 100.
- The median is NRCS's own per-station median for 1 April, calculated over 1991-2020 (or fewer years for a station without a full 30-year record); each station needs at least 10 years of record before NRCS gives it a median at all.
- The number of stations contributing changes year to year as Idaho's SNOTEL network has grown; years before 1981 are excluded because fewer than 10 stations had a valid median that early. Each observation's note field records how many stations were used that year.
- Values are rounded to the nearest whole percent.
Pages built on this dataset
Downloads
How to cite
Understand Idaho, “SNOTEL: 1 April Snow Water Equivalent, Percent of Median”, compiled from USDA Natural Resources Conservation Service, SNOTEL: 1 April Snow Water Equivalent, Percent of Median. Retrieved September 8, 2026. https://understandidaho.com/data/nrcs-snowpack/. CC BY 4.0.
Cite USDA Natural Resources Conservation Service directly for the figures themselves.
This page was last updated .