snotelpy

A modern Python interface for USDA SNOTEL data.

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Why snotelpy?

The NRCS is transitioning away from the legacy WSDL/SOAP API toward a modern RESTful interface. No actively maintained Python package exists for it yet. snotelpy fills that gap — clean xarray Datasets, automatic chunking for large requests, and built-in spatial filtering by HUC watershed, county, or station name.

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Install

pip install snotelpy

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Quick Example

import snotelpy as sp

ds = sp.fetch_snotel(
    stations=["602:CO:SNTL", "913:CO:SNTL"],
    elements=["WTEQ", "SNWD"],
    start_date="2022-10-01",
    end_date="2023-06-30"
)

sp.plot.element_timeseries(ds, element="WTEQ")

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Basin Summary Example

out = sp.basin_summary(
    hucs=[1019],
    elements=["WTEQ"],
    duration="MONTHLY",
    start_date="2000-10-01",
    end_date="2025-10-01",
    climatology_period=("2000-10-01", "2025-10-01")
)

# Basin-averaged SWE statistics (MEAN, MEDIAN, MAX, MIN) x time
print(out["basin_stats"])

# Monthly climatology
print(out["climatology"])

# All stations in the basin as a GeoDataFrame
print(out["stations"].head())

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What you can do

• Fetch daily, hourly, or monthly data for any SNOTEL station or wildcard
• Filter stations by HUC watershed, county, or element availability
• Summarize entire basins with mean, median, max, min, and monthly climatology
• Plot multi-station time series with one line
• Save directly to NetCDF, GeoJSON, or .CSV

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Data Source

Data is retrieved live from the USDA NRCS AWDB REST API.

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Full API Reference

See the API docs for complete parameter documentation.