Early signs point to water woes

Associated Press

ATLANTA

Beaver dams have been demolished, burbling fountains silenced, and the drinking water in one southern town has taken on the light brownish color of sweet tea.

Though water shortages have yet to drastically change most people’s lifestyles, southerners are beginning to realize that they’ll need to save their drinking supplies with no end in sight to an eight-month drought.

Already, watering lawns and washing cars are restricted in some parts of the South, and more severe water limits loom if long-range forecasts of below-normal rain hold true through the rest of 2016.

The drought arrived without warning in Chris Benson’s bathroom last week in Griffin, Ga.

“My son noticed it when he went to take his bath for the evening,” said Benson, 43. “The water was kind of a light brown color, and after we ran it for a while, it actually looked like a light-colored tea. A little disturbing.”

The problem was that Griffin’s reservoir is nearly 8 feet below normal, leaving “a high level of manganese” in the remaining water, but not making it unsafe, city officials told residents in a Nov. 16 update.

Benson watched that water turn from brown to “kind of a light green tint” before clearing up, he said.

It’s no better in Tennessee, where about 300 of the state’s 480 water systems serve areas suffering moderate to exceptional drought, the Tennessee Emergency Management Agency said.

Across the South, communities relying on depleted watersheds can’t afford to waste what they’ve got left, said Denise Gutzmer at the National Drought Mitigation Center in Lincoln, Neb.

“For some of these small communities, they are in trouble and they will need to be very careful about their water use to conserve,” Gutzmer said. “Just like when a bank account gets low, you become much more conscientious about how you spend the remaining dollars you have.”