The Pennsylvania Department of Environmental Protection placed 36 counties under a drought watch Wednesday, including the entire Times News coverage area.

The impacted areas are on the eastern side of the state, and include Carbon, Schuylkill, Monroe, Lehigh and Northampton counties.

Because of the dry conditions, residents are asked to voluntary reduce their water usage.

“A few counties have experienced very dry conditions over the summer, and a number of others have inched into increasingly dry conditions in recent weeks. We’re asking Pennsylvanians in all of these counties to use water wisely and follow simple water conservation tips to ease the demand for water,” said DEP Acting Secretary Ramez Ziadeh.

Residents in the affected counties are asked to reduce their individual water use by 5 to 10%, or a reduction of 3 to 6 gallons of water per day.

The Department of Environmental Protection is notifying all water suppliers in these counties for the need to monitor their supplies and be prepared by updating their drought contingency plans as necessary. Varying localized conditions may lead water suppliers or municipalities to ask residents for more stringent conservation actions, according to DEP.

Six suppliers have already asked residents to voluntarily reduce their water use, among them are the Palmerton Municipal Water Authority.

A drought watch is the first notice issued. Dryer conditions could result in drought warnings or drought emergencies.

To determine drought conditions, DEP assesses information on public water supply levels and data on four indicators: precipitation, surface water (stream and river) flow, groundwater level, and soil moisture. DEP said that declarations aren’t based on one indicator alone, such as precipitation.

DEP has a drought coordinator who monitors the indicators in partnership with the U.S. Geological Survey, which maintains gauges in streams and wells in many Pennsylvania locations.

The next Commonwealth Drought Task Force meeting is at 1 p.m. Sept 13.

Our area

In Slatington, the drinking water supply is fine, but not Trout Creek.

“Trout Creek is exceptionally low,” said Dan Stevens, the business manager for Slatington borough. “It’s as low as you’ll ever see. We need a couple days of rain.”

Stevens said the drinking water supply is fine, because it comes from springs on Blue Mountain.

“I know it’s really dry, but we’re fine. We’re blessed with an abundance of water,” he said. “We can’t even use all of what comes out of the springs.”

Stevens said the borough and the areas around it supplied by water use between 300,000 and 500,000 gallons of water a day. If needed, the borough also has wells it can use as backup.

“Even in the worst drought, we’ve always had ample water,” he said.

Palmerton Borough Manager Donna McGarry noted that last month, the borough requested residents take steps to conserve water.

“However, we have seen no change in the amount of water demand,” McGarry said. “Low water levels required that we adjust our water pumping procedures to meet demand.

“Since we did not see a reduction in water use as requested, conservation remains important until the water table improves.”

Tamaqua borough Manager Kevin Steigerwalt said Tamaqua Water Authority customers haven’t been asked to cut back or make any modifications in their water usage.

The Still Creek Reservoir, which has a capacity of 2.9 billion gallons of water, provides the water to about 7,000 households.

“We have a lot of water per capita,” Steigerwalt explained.

He noted that in other years when drought watches or warnings were issued by the state, the borough was exempt from the restrictions because of the large supply.

“We will keep an eye on it nonetheless. I don’t foresee an issue for our customers because historically we haven’t had issues with the water.” Steigerwalt said.

No restrictions due to the drought watch have been put in place as of Wednesday for customers of the Lansford-Coaldale Joint Water Authority.

Authority supervisor Toby Krajcirik said customers will be alerted if the authority decides to do so.

“We always want customers to conserve water - that’s a no brainer,” he said.

The authority draws its water from eight wells in the Lake Hauto area.

Terry Ahner and Jill Whalen contributed to this report.