Qu’Appelle River Watershed Updates

• Most of the lakes in the Qu’Appelle system are currently at or near their targeted fall operating range.
• Buffalo Pound and Katepwa lakes are slightly above their October operating range.
• Crooked Lake is slightly below its October operating range.

• The Qu’Appelle River Dam release has been 0 m³/s since October 10 to accommodate an inspection of the dam’s outlet works as well as surveying and equipment installation on the Upper Qu’Appelle channel. The release will be resumed on October 20 at a flow rate of 2 m³/s, which is the typical Qu’Appelle River Dam winter outflow. This temporary reduction in inflow to Buffalo Pound Lake caused a slight decline in the lake level towards the normal operating range.
• Inflow to Buffalo Pound Lake is 0.35 m³/s. The lake level is at 509.48 m this morning, which is 16 cm above the top of the fall operating range (509.32 m).
• There is currently 3 m³/s outflow from Buffalo Pound Dam. The outflow will remain at this rate until it is reduced for winter, near the end of October.

• The water level of Wascana Lake at the Marina is at 570.56 m this morning, which is 4 cm above its target operating level of 570.52 m.
• No further operations are planned at this time.

• Last Mountain Lake is currently at 489.98 m, which is 2 cm below the top of the October operating range (490.00 m).
• Currently, about 0.5 m³/s of flow is naturally moving from the Qu’Appelle River into Last Mountain Lake due to local flows generated by the October 12 rainfall event.

• Pasqua and Echo lakes are currently at 478.66 m, which is within the targeted operating range for October – 18 cm below the top of the fall operating range (478.84 m).
• The first of three fall operations occurred on September 18. During this operation, 3 stoplogs were removed from each of the 8 bays. Since then, the lake level has dropped by 34 cm, and the current outflow is about 2.4 m³/s.
• Water levels are expected to drop further following the second and third stoplog removal operations, scheduled for October 21st and October 29th, respectively.

• The water levels of Mission and Katepwa lakes have increased due to the release from Echo Lake, which peaked on September 25 at 478.36 m. They are currently slowly decreasing.
• As of this morning, the levels are slightly above the operating range and are sitting at 478.27 m, which is 5 cm above the weir’s crest of 478.22 m.

• Inflows to Crooked Lake are about 3.2 m³/s.
• The Crooked Lake water level is currently close to the bottom of the normal operating range. It is sitting at 451.07 m this morning, which is 3 cm below the bottom of the fall operating range (451.10 m).
• All stoplogs and bulkheads were removed from Bays 3, 4, and 7 on October 2, resulting in a water level reduction of 52 cm up to today.
• A second operation using a mobile crane occurred on October 16 to remove the remaining stoplogs from Bays 5 and 6 – all stoplogs and bulkheads are now removed for the winter.

• The water level of Round Lake is within the normal operating range for October, currently at 441.98 m this morning. Since October 2, the lake level has increased by 24 cm due to the operations conducted at Echo and Crooked lakes.
• Drawdown operations from upstream reservoirs are temporarily increasing the Round Lake level above the levels seen during the summer.
• The upstream operations have led to an increase in downstream flows. Since October 5, streamflow near Welby [05JM001] has been gradually rising, peaking around 8 m³/s on October 15, then slightly receding for three days before building up again, with 7.9 m³/s recorded this morning.

Meteorological Condition

• Observed: Up to 20 mm of precipitation was recorded in the downstream part of the basin, near Broadview.
• Forecast: No significant precipitation is forecasted for the next 7 days.