Officials have said California would need to have a record setting year of rain and snow to break the four-year drought. So an average year, while good, won’t be enough.

California gets most of its water from October to April, with the bulk of that coming in December through February. To help alleviate the drought, a lot of that water has to fall as snow in the mountains, where it can be banked until spring.

El Nino

For several winters now, high pressure has built in the northeastern Pacific, bringing warm and dry conditions to the western U.S. and cold to the East. This year’s El Nino in the Pacific Ocean changed weather patterns enough to put California back on track for a normal year of rain and snow thr.

As of the start of February, statewide snowpack was 116% of average, and for the season, precipitation is 105% of average, according to the California Climate Tracker at the Western Regional Climate Center in Reno, Nevada.

All but one of California’s largest reservoirs began the month below the historical average for the date, according to the Department of Water Resources.

A dry February “could be a setback to a year that had been behaving like a normal winter,” Anderson said.

Some optimism

There is some room for optimism, said Matthew Rosencrans of the U.S. Climate Prediction Center. Storms should be able to undercut the high pressure and hit California in the second half of February.

The climate center forecast is for above-average chances of rain and snow across southern California and a 50-50 chance in the northern part of the state.

“It’s not super likely it will get worse,” Rosencrans said from his office in College Park, Maryland.

For Anderson, there’s only one word he will use to sum up his current outlook: “Cautious.”

Related: California hit with series of El Nino-fueled rain storms causing flooding, mudslides

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