This winter’s below average snowfall, as one might expect, indicates there could be a low runoff this spring. “The outlook for runoff in the Upper Colorado, North Platte, Yampa, White and South Platte rivers continues to call for well below average flows,” said Allen Green, state conservationist with the Natural Resources Conservation Service, a department of the U.S. Department of Agriculture. According to Mike Gillespie, the snow survey supervisor for the NRCS Colorado Snow Survey, the projection for spring and early summer flows in the Fryingpan River into Ruedi Reservoir above Basalt will be 74 percent of average. The spring flows in the Roaring Fork River at its confluence with the Colorado River in Glenwood Springs is now projected to be 83 percent of average. And the flows in the Colorado River just east of Grand Junction at Cameo are projected to be 75 percent of average.The recent heavy snowfall in Southern Colorado has boosted the runoff projections for southern rivers, Gillespie said. The projected spring runoff in the Gunnison and Arkansas rivers is about 80 percent to 90 percent. “It does improve as you go south,” Gillespie said. As of Feb. 1, the snowpack in the Roaring Fork River basin was 82 percent of average and 60 percent of last year. The snowpack in the Colorado River basin was at 72 percent of average and 59 percent of last year. And the statewide snowpack on Feb. 1 was at 86 percent and 73 percent of last winter, according to the NRCS.