ventura county watershed rainfall totals map

The Front Fire Closure has been lifted and Rockfront OHV is once again open to the public.NOTE: Hwy 1 in southern Monterey County is closing as needed in advance of any larger storm. NOTE: The Ojai District plans on closing their seasonal gates on December 15, which includes Pine Mtn. and the Los Padres NF website are good places to check road closures but we strongly suggest calling your local Ranger Station in advance to make sure of the gate status.

In advance of this most recent storm, the LPNF has begun closing some of their seasonal and wet weather gates.And if you come across any fresh downed trees or trail slides, take photos and post on HLP and we’ll make sure a nearby trail crew gets the call. If you’re heading into the forest be sure to check the weather in detail before you go and let someone know where you’re going and when you’ll be back. There is more rain on tap for next week along with some colder temperatures. The rain has fallen hard at times so expect to see some extended road closures and some slides and trees down across the trails. Most of the forest is set to see anywhere between 1-5+ inches of rain depending on location. The Los Padres is in the midst of our first large winter storm of the 2018-2019 rain season.Lets hope that sometime in the future we’ll look back at this new normal era with solutions that can prevent all the damage and death we’ve had to endure of late. Wildfire is certainly a hot topic of late, not just here in the Western United States but across the world, even grabbing the attention of our President. If you’re interested in the subject of wildfires, I think you’ll enjoy listening to the Outside podcast. While we might not know the answers, Outside Magazine recently created a four-part podcast series covering wildfires that does a really good job of outlining some of the questions. It’s likely that the answers here in the Los Padres are different than the answers in the Cleveland or Santa Monica’s or the Sierra Nevada dead pine tree belt. I don’t know if anyone knows the answers. I’m not going to pretend to know the answers. There is a ton of commentary about why we’re dealing with such large fires, who is to blame and how moving forward we can protect ourselves and our forests against these ever-growing conflagrations. So far I’m not a very big fan of the new normal. Unfortunately, we saw the same thing again this year with the Camp and Woolsey Fires starting late in the “wildfire season”. Having wildfire that late in the season validated the now common statement that “Wildfire Knows No Season”. Not only was the Thomas Fire the largest wildfire in California’s history but the timing of the fire also led to the destructive and deadly Montecito debris flows just a few weeks later. This will surely be a week of reflection for most of us as we look back at the Thomas Fire, which started just about a year ago on December 4, 2017.

Ventura county watershed rainfall totals map