Southern Los Padres Drought 2014

Between you and me I'd really like to not feel compelled to have to do this again next year.

Last year I wrote a post which listed most of the water sources that hikers and backpackers rely on while exploring the backcountry of Ventura County and Santa Barbara County. Well, if anything this years situation is even more dire. You'll recall that it rained this last winter... once. So yeah, things aren't peachy. 

This year's page is a community effort, hopefully more so than last year's. This is my appeal to you, the readers, for your help in filling the blanks so we can all benefit. Thanks in advance.

Last year's format was more of an experiment than anything else, but the response was large and apparently of value to more people than I could have guessed. This one will follow a similar vein but I'll be including a few creeks and springs that didn't show up last time, and for clarity's sake I've chosen to make how we grade the water supply in those sources less subjective to interpretation. I will try to group sources first by county, and second by the general region (where applicable), so water sources should be located next to other nearby sources. 

Here's the 0-5 scale I'm putting in place for rating individual water sources, and it goes like this:

0.) dry as a very old bone

1.) damp enough for mosquitos to successfully reproduce but of little use to humans

2.) scummy, muddy, murky and questionable as even an emergency water source

3.) scant flow (if any), relatively clean standing pools, filter friendly water

4.) clean and reliable flow, totally good water for building strong bones and teeth

5.) Happy times, care free swimming, happy little fish, you get the point... 

Please don't email me these nuggets of information. Instead, I'd prefer that you all use the comments section of this post to briefly share this info with everybody. This way there's room for everyone's comments and for updates to that information, and I don't have to continually update this page with scattershot email beta. Examples of how I'd ideally like these comments go would be:

Mission Pine Springs, #1, JT Kirk

or

Upper Manzana Creek, #4, JE Hoover

Here we go...

Ventura County

Front Country

Matilija Creek: #5, DS

Murietta Creek: #2, DS

Murietta Spring: ?

The Pines Spring: ?

Sisar Creek: #3, DS

White Ledge Spring: ?

Lower Santa Paula Creek: #5, DS

Upper Santa Paula Creek: ?

Cienega Camp Spring: ?

Tar Creek: #3, DS

Piru Creek: #4, DS

Back Country

Upper Sespe: #3, DS

Middle Sespe: #4, Beth 

Lower Sespe: #4, DS

Rock Creek: #4, Beth

Bear Creek: ?

Piedra Blanca Creek: #4, Nico

Alder Creek: ?

Agua Blanca Creek: #2

Choro Grande Springs: #3, Nico

High Country

Reyes Creek: #4, DS

Beartrap Creek: #4, DS

Pine Mtn Lodge: #3, Nico

Cedar Creek: ?

Fishbowls Creek: ?

Mutau Creek: ?

Little Mutau Creek: ?

Cobblestone Spring: #0, DS

Mesa Spring: ?

Sheep Camp Spring: #4, S. Byrne

Santa Barbara County

North East 

Rancho Nuevo Creek: ?

Deal Junction: ?

Santa Barbara Canyon: #0, DS

Madulce Station: ?

Chokecherry Spring: ?

Upper Sisquoc: #4, 02/14, Grizz

Sierra Madre Springs

Hog Pen Spring: #3, Mike

Montgomery 1: #0, Mike

Montgomery 2:, #4

Jackson Spring: #1, Mike

Black Willow Spring: #1, Mike

Oak Spring: #2, KFox

South East:

Agua Caliente Creek: ?

Lacosca Creek: ?

Juncal Creek: ?

Mono Creek: #0 in 02/14, Nico

Mono Narrows: ?

Indian Creek: #4, David B.

Central San Rafael

Oso Canyon: ?

Redrock Canyon: ?

Little Pine Spring: ?

Santa Cruz Creek: ?

Peach Tree Canyon: ?

Mission Pine Spring: #4, 04/14, Bardley, Grizz

McKinley Spring: ?

Lower Sisquac: #3, 02/14, Grizz

Montgomery Spring: ?

Jackson Spring: ?

White Ledge Canyon: #4, 03/14, Grizz

Upper Manzana Creek: #4, DS

Fish Creek: ?

Lower Manzana Creek: #0 (at Schoolhouse), #0 (at Dabney) KFox

Tunnel Spring: ?

South Fork Brea Creek: ?

North Fork Brea Creek: ?

Bear Canyon: ?

As you can see, there's a lot of blanks on this page. Notice anything important that I missed? Please let me know. I look forward to helping you all help this work. Bring it.

Additional resources of this nature may be found at: HikeTheLosPadres.com