SPOKANE Lands managers hope the expected departure of the El Nino weather pattern this spring will help the Inland Northwest make up for a winter that was short on snow and rain.

In many parts of eastern Washington and northern Idaho, farms, forests and rivers need water, and snowpacks and field moistur

e are down.

''Right now, we can use more water,'' said Bill Weller, hydrologis

t for the U.S. Soil and Conservation Service.

Sunday's beginning of spring ended a mild winter that the Nationa

l Weather Service said

was the third driest on record in Spokane.

Only 19.5 inches of snow fell in Spokane during winter, compared to 87.3 inches the previous winter and an average of 56.9 inches.

The dry weather is blamed in part on El Nino, a Spanish word meaning ''little boy'' that refers to a weather pattern occurring every three to seven years. A warming of ocean waters off Peru changes atmospheric jet streams, affecting weather in an area stretching from South America's Pacific Coast to Alaska.

In the Northwest, El Nino brings drier weather in the winter as jet streams steer clouds carrying rain and snow away from the area.

El Nino is likely to leave in coming months, said Ken Holmes, a meteorologist for the National Weather Service in Spokane.

''We're looking for a more typical summer weather pattern than we've seen in the past,'' Holmes said.

Despite the Inland Northwest's dry winter, southern British Columbia received high snowfall. As a result, the Columbia River is predicted to flow at 100 percent of normal this summer at the point where it enters Washington from Canada.

However, most rivers in northern Idaho and northeastern and central Washington are forecast to run at below-normal levels.

Ma

ny southern Washington rivers fared well because of a late winter storm that dumped up to four feet of snow in the Cascades and in the Blue Mountains.