CUTTER CANYON – Cutter Reservoir is an incongruous sight. The 10ish miles of dirt road it takes to reach it, up San Juan County Road 4450, is not suggestive of water. Thanks to oilfield money, the road is good as northwest New Mexico washboard dirt roads go. )We counted 21 well pads between the reservoir …
A shape with lion body and the head of a man, A gaze blank and pitiless as the sun, Is moving its slow thighs, while all about it Reel shadows of the indignant desert birds. – William Butler Yeats A friend sent me a note last night with the memorable subject line – “slouching towards …
Continue reading ‘Rio Grande at Embudo – “slouching towards intermittency”’ »
The U.S. Geological Survey took new measurements last week to calibrate the key gauge on the Gila River in New Mexico, and the rating curve has now been adjusted upward. The good news is that 2018 is no longer a record low year. Thursday’s revised flow of 14 cubic feet per second was still the …
Continue reading ‘Good news, or at least news that’s less bad, on the Gila’ »
The remnants of Hurricane Bud blew through central New Mexico today, the first big rain we’ve had since forever. As the rains were clearing out, I hopped on my bicycle to check out the neighborhood flood control channel (as one does) and lucked into one of Albuquerque’s great sunset treats. It happens when the sun …
Amy Haas, deputy director and general counsel of the Upper Colorado River Commission, will replace the retiring Don Ostler as the UCRC’s executive director July 1. Amy, formerly general counsel of the New Mexico Interstate Stream Commission, has been with the commission since last year, and has a long history of working within the interstate …
I’ve no idea what’s going on here, but a reader asked, so here’s a graph of the San Francisco River near Glenwood, New Mexico.
Reservoir levels dropped over the weekend past a critical trigger point, causing the Middle Rio Grande Conservancy District to curtail water deliveries this week to about 5,000 acres of farmland in central New Mexico. With El Vado Reservoir on the Rio Chama just 26 percent full, the decision to cut deliveries to the MRGCD’s “water …
Continue reading ‘Central New Mexico water agency cutting back some of its irrigators’ »
If my math is correct, flow on the Gila River gauge located near Gila, New Mexico, dropped today to the lowest ever measured, in a record that goes back 89 years. The red line is the daily flow, in cubic feet per second, as measured by the U.S. Geological Survey. The cloud of gray lines …
Continue reading ‘Lowest flow ever recorded on New Mexico’s Gila River’ »
Out bike riding yesterday morning, my friend Scot and I were watching the radar app and judging wind and storm direction, dodging the occasional raindrops with a spectacular sky around us. (In fact our ride was delayed because Scot had to put the goat in, something about lightning-goat risks.) But despite the stormy show, the …
Continue reading ‘Some context on central New Mexico’s big June 4 storm’ »