Lake Waco, TX (FOX 44) – Lake Waco’s water levels are back to normal thanks to recent storms. However, that is not the case for the Lake Waco wetlands–which are still completely dry because of the drought.

You might be thinking that with all this rain we’ve been getting lately, how are the wetlands not… wet? The issue doesn’t lie in the lack of rain. The issue lies in a clogged pipe.

In order for the wetlands to not be the drylands, water must be pumped from Lake Waco through an intake pipe.

“We have to make sure that there’s enough water in the lake,” says Jessica Emmett Sellers of the Waco Water Utility Department.

A year-and-a-half ago at the peak of the drought, lake levels fell below the intake…

“So when the water got below those intakes, we weren’t able to pump water into the wetland,” says Emmett Sellers.

The lake levels are now back to normal, but a new problem has emerged–the intake pipe responsible for filling the lake Waco wetlands–is clogged.

“They can’t run the pumps, because that would be potentially damaging to whatever is stuck in there–and they’re not sure what it is,” says Emmett Sellers.

Getting to the bottom of the problem, is on the top of the city of Waco’s to-do list.

“I have actually put the repair of that out for bid. So we’re going to get an outside contractor to handle that, which should hopefully make that a little bit speedier than if it went into kind of a queue of repairs for the city, which are our numerous,” Emmett Sellers says.

As for the wetland’s wildlife — they remained unharmed.

“The Bosque River flows real near the wetlands, so a lot of the animals were able to kind of migrate over there and make new homes,” says Emmett Sellers.

The wetlands area is still open to the public.

“That’s one of the educational opportunities that’s out there, is for people to kind of get out in a little bit of a kind of an untamed nature scape, you know, to kind of enjoy that and see how everything works,” Emmett Sellers adds.