Camanche Reservoir Water Level
Camanche Reservoir is at 222.88 ft today (Oct 30), 12.62 ft below its 235.5 ft full pool, down 0.19 ft this week.
California · Mokelumne River
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Water level history
About Camanche Reservoir
Camanche Reservoir is a reservoir on the Mokelumne River in California, operated by East Bay Municipal Utility District. Its full summer pool sits at 235.5 ft above sea level. Live water levels come from the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers (CWMS) and update hourly.
Understanding Camanche Reservoir's water level
Camanche is the second of East Bay MUD's two big Mokelumne River reservoirs, and it does a different job from the first. Pardee, about ten miles upstream, holds the drinking water that runs 90 miles west to 1.4 million East Bay customers. Camanche catches what comes out of Pardee and stores it for the river below: fishery flows, riparian habitat, downstream water rights holders, and flood control. That division of labor shows up in the numbers. On 27 April 2015, in the middle of the driest four years EBMUD had on record, Pardee sat at 90 percent of capacity while Camanche was down to 104,790 acre-feet, about 25 percent. When the Mokelumne runs short, this is the lake that gives up its water first.
The dam is an earthfill embankment 171 feet high with its crest at elevation 263 feet, backed by three dikes up to 90 feet tall. Construction began in August 1962, the outlet valves were closed on 18 December 1963, and the district dates completion to 1964. The 235.5 foot figure used as full pool is the crest of the ogee spillway at Dike 3, which can pass 197,000 cubic feet per second; at that level the Corps lists gross pool storage of 430,900 acre-feet. Flood releases are capped at 5,000 cubic feet per second, the most a 1972 USGS study found the lower river channel could carry without overtopping its banks. EBMUD ran the river at that limit in 1997, when the reservoir spilled slightly, again in 2006, and in June 2011 after a late storm and heavy snowmelt.
Below the dam the river is managed largely for fish. A 1998 settlement among EBMUD, the California Department of Fish and Wildlife and the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service sets minimum releases from Camanche, later written into the district's water rights by the State Water Resources Control Board, and limits how fast flows can drop in fall and winter. The Mokelumne River Hatchery, built at the base of the dam in 1963 to replace spawning ground the reservoir covered, raises fall run Chinook salmon and steelhead; the state runs it and EBMUD owns it. Woodbridge Irrigation District also draws on Camanche releases each summer and fall. The reservoir itself covers the gold rush settlements of Camanche, Lancha Plana and Poverty Bar.
Camanche Reservoir — frequently asked
What is Camanche Reservoir's full pool elevation?
235.5 feet, which is the crest of the dam's ogee spillway. The Corps of Engineers lists 430,900 acre-feet of storage at that level, while EBMUD's dam guide gives a capacity of 417,120 acre-feet. The top of the dam is 263 feet, leaving 27.5 feet of freeboard above the spillway crest. Water above 235.5 feet goes over the spillway chute at Dike 3.
What is Camanche Reservoir's record high level?
In the state's daily elevation record, which begins in 1990, the peak is 235.89 feet on 6 January 1997, a little under half a foot over the spillway crest. EBMUD has described that winter as a slight spill, with releases to the Mokelumne pushed to the 5,000 cubic feet per second channel limit. Monthly storage data back to 1964 tops out at 423,070 acre-feet, reached in July 1967 and again in May 1979.
What is the lowest Camanche Reservoir has been?
The deepest drawdowns came early. State monthly storage records show about 43,000 acre-feet in December 1977 and less than 10,000 acre-feet from September 1988 through February 1989, bottoming at 9,220. The modern low came in 2015, when storage fell to 81,940 acre-feet in August and the surface dropped to 170.84 feet on 6 September, the lowest reading in the daily elevation record that starts in 1990.
Why is Camanche Reservoir so low when Pardee is full?
The two lakes serve different purposes. Pardee holds EBMUD's drinking water supply, so the district keeps it as full as it can. Camanche carries the downstream obligations: minimum fish flows set under the 1998 settlement, deliveries to Woodbridge Irrigation District and other water rights holders, and cold water for salmon. In a dry year those releases keep going even when inflow from Pardee shrinks, so Camanche drops first and furthest.
How much water can Camanche release into the Mokelumne River?
Flood releases are held to 5,000 cubic feet per second. A 1972 USGS study of 39 miles of channel below the dam found that flow stays mostly within the banks, while 5,000 to 6,000 would spill overbank in several reaches. EBMUD reached that ceiling in 1997, 2006 and June 2011, when it stepped releases from 3,000 to 5,000 in about a day after a 1.6 inch storm.
What is the Mokelumne River Hatchery?
A state fish hatchery at the foot of Camanche Dam, built in 1963 to offset the salmon spawning habitat lost when the reservoir filled. EBMUD owns it and the California Department of Fish and Wildlife operates it, raising fall run Chinook salmon and steelhead. Returns have grown sharply since the 1998 agreement; the 2011 run set a record of about 18,000 salmon. EBMUD manages cold water releases from Camanche and Pardee partly to help these fish.
What town is under Camanche Reservoir?
The reservoir flooded the old gold rush communities of Camanche, Lancha Plana and Poverty Bar. Camanche had remained a small town, and EBMUD evacuated it to make way for the dam, which was started in August 1962 and finished in 1964. The reservoir sits where Amador, Calaveras and San Joaquin counties meet, and the hatchery that replaced the river's lost spawning beds sits just below the dam.
Other lakes near Camanche Reservoir
- Don Pedro ReservoirCA
- Boca ReservoirCA
- Eastman LakeCA
- Black Butte LakeCA
- Englebright LakeCA
- Lake BerryessaCA
See current levels for all 29 California lakes and reservoirs →
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