Flathead Lake levels will likely fall short of the historic summer maximum this year thanks to dwindling moisture in the surrounding mountains, the operators of the dam that controls the lake predicted Thursday.

Recent warm, dry conditions have decreased water supply in the Flathead River Basin, wrote a spokesman for the Confederated Salish and Kootenai Tribes. The tribes own Energy Keepers, the corporation that operates the Se̓liš Ksanka Qĺispe̓ (SKQ) Dam at the foot of the Flathead Lake.

“Spring runoff is quickly receding bringing river flows to extremely low levels,” the spokesman, Robert McDonald, wrote in a press release. “... These conditions have forced operations at SKQ (Dam) to again be at license-required minimums and filling Flathead Lake as aggressively as possible while avoi

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