Concerning news for California: El Niño's misbehavin'. But there is still time for him to do the right thing

In this animation of false-color satellite images of California's central Sierra Nevada range (which runs diagonally through the frames), red and orange tones are indicative of snowpack. On Feb. 5, 2016, snowpack in the area stood at 110 percent of average for the date. By Feb. 16, it had dropped to 91 percent. In the images, acquired by NASA's Terra satellite, Lake Tahoe is in the upper center; Mono Lake is toward the lower right. (Images: NASA Worldview. Animation: Tom Yulsman) Woops. Thanks to a dearth of precipitation combined with warm temperatures, snowpack in California's Sierra Nevada mountains has dipped below average. Given that El Niño was supposed to be California's great drought-bustin' hope, this is a little concerning. I put together the animation above to show what has happened in the Sierra over the past two weeks. The mountains run diagonally through the frames. The animation consists of false-color images captured by NASA's Terra satellite. Snow is rendered in red and orange tones so that it can be discerned easily. Water shows up in almost black tones, and you can easily see Lake Tahoe in the upper middle of the animation. Mono Lake on the east side of the Sierra is at lower right. On Feb. 5, 2016, the snowpack in the central Sierra Nevada region stood at 110 percent of average for the date. By Feb. 16, it had shrunk to 91 percent. That's a decrease of 17 percent in just two weeks — as dramatized by all that shrinking red and orange in the animation. As I'm writing this on the 17th, the average for the entire Sierra Nevada range in California is at 91 percent for the date. Given the super El Niño now underway, one would have hoped for better than that. It's not unheard of for El Niño to misbehave for a spell. As the National Weather Service pointed out in a Tweet on Feb. 9, California usually does experience some dry periods even during El Niño winters: https://twitter.com/NWSSacramento/status/697119968970698752 But since they Tweeted that, another nine days went by without significant precipitation in the mountains. And while the Sierra is getting a nice dump today (Feb. 18), high pressure is forecast to build right back in — and the forecast for the following 10 days isn't too encouraging. What about the big picture? How have things been shaping up compared to what we might have expected? Again, over the relatively short term — about 30 days — the word "misbehavin'" still seems to apply. The odds are that during an El Niño, and particularly a strong one like the current one, precipitation will be above normal along the southern tier of the United States, from California east through Texas and on into the Southeast. But for the past 30 days, the pattern looks strangely opposite to that.