© Yosemite National ParkYosemite Falls got extra pizzazz in September after rain and snowfall fed into Yosemite Creek.
This is unusual.
Yosemite Falls is as an ephemeral waterfall fed by snowmelt and usually expires for a couple weeks or months in late summer.
Scott Gediman, a public information officer for Yosemite, has worked in the park for 20 years and he doesn't remember the waterfalls ever flowing continuously through the summer into fall.
"In an average year or even in a drought, Yosemite Falls goes dry from early to mid-July," Gediman says.
"With the record or near-record snowpack, Yosemite Falls is still going. It never dried up."
Gediman added that Bridal Veil, which also takes a vacation in later summer and early fall, is still going, while Sentinel and Horsetail Falls have stopped.
Last week, Yosemite and Bridal Veil got a recharge with up to a foot of snow falling in the Tuolomne Meadows area and then warmer temperatures causing the snowfall to melt.
"Generally a mid-September trip to Yosemite Valley is beautiful because the colors are starting to change but you don't get waterfalls," Gediman says. "To have waterfalls this time of the year is a bonus."
He adds: "It's always interesting to me because visitors don't know the difference. But sometimes among the rangers, when we see people photographing a waterfall in September, we say they don't know what they're seeing."
The barrage of storms that pounded the Sierra Nevada this past winter and spring added up to a snowpack that's massive. The Sierra continued to receive snow through April and even into early June, and on June 1 the snowpack stood at 192 percent of normal, SFGATE reported in a previous story.
As warmer temperatures led all of this snow began to melt in May, Yosemite's waterfalls roared at extraordinary levels through spring and summer.
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