From The Pueblo Chieftain (Chris Woodka):
Wells in the Arkansas Valley protected the agriculture economy in 2012, but reduced pumping levels this year are likely to hurt farming if weather conditions don’t improve. “Wells provided a one-year hedge against drought,” Water Division 2 Engineer Steve Witte told the Lower Arkansas Valley Water Conservancy District board Wednesday. “To quote Dale Mauch (a Lamar-area farmer quoted in The Pueblo Chieftain last summer): ‘If you’ve got a well, you’ve got a crop.’ ” This year, the situation is worse for farmers who rely on wells. Because of in-state shortfalls, pumping levels have been curtailed for most farmers. Unless farmers use their own surface rights to augment wells, pumping levels will be at only 10 to 30 percent of normal, with many farmers forced to shut off the pumps completely.
Last year, farmers pumped about 110,000 acrefeet of water (36 billion gallons), which was roughly three-fourths of the historical average prior to restrictions. The farm economy suffered much more, however, because of other factors.
During the drought of 2011-12, soil moisture plummeted, a trend that has continued since 2000. There also was less water available to surface ditches in both years.
Another problem for farmers will be increased transit loss as water from storage is released to headgates downstream. Normal loss from Pueblo Dam to the Rocky Ford area would be about 12 percent, but with river levels lower, it increases to 50 percent, Witte said.
One ray of hope offered at the meeting is a steadily increasing snowpack that is approaching nearly normal levels at a few sites in the mountains. Statewide, snowpack was about 82 percent of normal Wednesday, 73 percent in the Arkansas River basin, but 94 percent in the Upper Colorado basin, which provides supplemental water to Arkansas River users.
However, snowpack in the Purgatoire River basin, which helps farmers below John Martin Dam, is far below average.
Reservoir levels are well below 2012, and at 2003 levels for Turquoise and Twin Lakes. Lake Pueblo is at 88 percent of normal, better than it was in 2003, after drought had tapped out water supplies.
From The Pueblo Chieftain (Chris Woodka):
A water quality study spawned 10 years ago is focusing on finding causes for sedimentation and loading of harmful elements like selenium and uranium into the Arkansas River. “The real desire is to assist resource managers to find the source of a problem and attack it there, rather than put an ineffective plan in place,” said David Mau, head of the U.S. Geological Survey Pueblo office. He spoke at Wednesday’s meeting of the Lower Arkansas Valley Water Conservancy District.
The study began through a 2003 agreement among Aurora, the Southeastern Colorado Water Conservancy District and the Upper Arkansas Water Conservancy District.
The water resources group also includes Colorado Springs Utilities, the Pueblo Board of Water Works and the Lower Ark district. Aurora provided the initial funding.
The purpose of the study was to establish a water quality baseline before large projects like the Preferred Storage Options Plan, Southern Delivery System and Arkansas Valley Conduit went online. The USGS cataloged existing data on the river.
A 2009-11 study looked at two threatened reaches of the Arkansas River: from Canon City to Lake Pueblo, and from Lake Pueblo to La Junta. Loading of solids and uranium were found in both reaches, while heavy loading of selenium from Fountain Creek was prevalent downstream.
Mau said studies will continue to pinpoint sources of the pollution to help minimize the impact on water quality as projects continue.