Recent rains in the area have really put a damper on summer fun but have also offered relief from the scorching summer heat. One great benefit seems to be that the lakes have risen quite tremendously over the past few months coming from near nonexistence during the 2011 drought back to a normal pool elevation.

Experts on the local lakes (Toledo Bend, Sam Rayburn, and B.A. Steinhagen a.k.a Dam B) all agree that although it seems like the areas have gotten a lot of rain, in fact more than usual for this time of the year, that it still doesn't make a huge difference in the lake levels.

Essentially, they are saying that although rain does help the lake maintain and increase in elevation levels it still isn't necessarily going to flood overnight.

David LaRue of the Army Corps of Engineers said that as far as the generation of electricity out of Rayburn goes, "well yeah,[ it helps] when the lake is up, it would make more [electricity] available...more water can be released when the lake is up."

As far as the fear of flooding goes, LaRue doesn't necessarily see that being a problem yet, "the lake is still under flood storage, we still have a little over a foot to hit flood storage, its not unusual [for the water level] to be this high."

"The rains we've had here on Sam Rayburn is almost like a drop in a big puddle, [the lake] is 114,500 acres, it's a big lake," he said when explaining what impact a few inches of rain can make.

LaRue also said that if flooding were ever a predicted problem that there would be several different plans of action to take because of how far the lake stretches. "There'd be so many variations, like how much water is in the lake, where it [excessive waters] was at, if a storm was coming this way the guys in Ft. Worth would know when we should start releasing water so not to flood homes down south [end of the lake]," he said.

As far as any future predictions go, he admits that he can't predict completely what will happen with the pool level, but "unless it's a lot of rain I wouldn't expect it to [go up a lot.] Large as this lake is, it would take a lot of rain to reach flood pool."

Steven Dougharty with the Texas side of the Sabine River Authority over Toledo Bend said that although the lake is at what is considered a normal elevation, they are still not able to generate much electricity.

"[Toledo Bend] is back up to what we consider a relatively normal level," he said but also added that "we cease generation [of electricity] at 168 [pool level], when we're in the power sales contract months, right now they're not generating any because they know they will run out of water, we are just releasing a minimum downstream flow."

As for the recent rains in the area, he says, "overall there's not a real significant impact right now, there's not a lot of runoffs so far, it keeps the evaporation rate down, and keeps us from having to release as much for downstream flow."

Right now even B.A. Steinhagen isn't quite at flood pool, sitting at an elevation of 82.15 msl while the flood pool is at 83 and Rayburn's current elevation is at 163.09 and the normal pool is 164.4. Toledo is at a pool of 169.05 currently but the conservation pool elevation is 172.

The drought that plagued the entire area during 2011 and shut down many boat ramps on both Rayburn and Toledo Bend seems to be in remission with the forecasts of rainfall still coming in through the rest of the summer. This will give the lakes a period to recuperate from the drought conditions and also provide some cooler days for those in southeast Texas and western Louisiana.