Backcountry Water Oracle
34.09059, -111.46653

Castersen Seep

34.09059, -111.46653

Reported this seasonlast reported 3 months ago

How this site decides what it can and cannot say — the method.

Insufficient record

No read issued

9 reports — a correlation needs at least 10 before it means anything, so no read is issued here.

What people saw

9 observations between 2017-09-01 and 2026-06-30, ranging from dry to raging. Most recently dry, 3 months ago.

These are the observations themselves, not a forecast. Too few to correlate against rainfall, but they are what people actually found.

Somebody found this completely dry. A source that has been dry can be dry again, whatever the rest of the record says.

  • 2026-06-30Dry0.0
  • 2026-05-15Trickle0.4Several deep pools filled with good water, trickle going over the falls.
  • 2025-12-06Strong0.8Lots of water, including along the feeder creeks.
  • 2025-11-28Raging1.0Heavy flow down both creeks feeding into the area, water everywhere.
  • 2025-10-16Raging1.0Tons of water flowing down both creeks, plus there was a surprise seep seeping, tasted wonderful.
  • 2025-05-24Pools or dripping0.2Less water flowing from pool to pool than in Apr, still enough clear water to scoop around the algae.
  • 2025-04-25Moderate0.6Several algea-filled pools directly below the seep, trickling into larger, clear rock tanks that tasted... okay.
  • 2018-06-03Pools or dripping0.2Few tanks below still had water, though they were opaque.
  • 2017-09-01Pools or dripping0.2Well, the seep proper was dry, but there were tanks downstream that held water.

Why

The engine will still produce a number from 9 reports, and that number is noise. It will happily report a perfect correlation from two observations. On a screen where someone is deciding how much water to carry, that is the most dangerous thing this site could render, so it is not rendered.

1 more report would reach the 10 needed for a read.

Rainfall here

The last 60 days here have been wetter than usual for mid September — 84th percentile against 19 years of rainfall at this coordinate, through 2026-09-15.

This is rainfall, not water. It says what the weather has done here, not what is in the ground — a spring fed from deep water can run through a dry autumn, and a runoff channel can be empty two weeks after a wet one. Which of those this is takes reports to find out.

5.73 over 60 days, against 19 years at this coordinate. Band: wetter.

Nearest source with a record

Big Kahuna Falls - Mazatzal Wilderness 0.81 mi away 17 reports

This is a neighbour, not a substitute. Two sources this close can behave completely differently — one fed by groundwater that barely notices the weather, the other by runoff that is gone a week after the storm. Read it for the shape of the country, not as a proxy for this water.

This is the fix

Every dated observation moves this source closer to a read, and sharpens the ones around it too.

Add a report

What was the water doing when you were there? Every observation sharpens this source and, because nearby sources lend each other statistical strength, the ones around it.

The day you were standing there, not today. The forecast correlates rainfall up to this date, so a wrong date is worse than no report.

How much water?

Score the water you could actually use. If the seep itself has stopped but the rock tanks below it are holding, that is water — score the tanks.

In your own words. Kept verbatim — the number is what the model reads, but this is what a human checks when a forecast looks surprising.