MRGCD supports the State’s efforts to better understand and address human-driven water depletions in the Middle Rio Grande Valley. This includes the State’s pending metering order and a future evaluation of the cumulative effects of domestic wells. These are important steps toward improved water management and accountability. However, the bosque remains the largest source of …
The camera on my new phone is dope. I love bridge abutment graffiti, but it’s so hard to shoot because of the deep shadows and bright light. I love the geometry of the bridge structures, the way it interacts with the writing, the lines and brights and shadows, the three conceptual layers – river, and …
Green acreage in non-Pueblo MRGCD irrigable parcels, summer 2026 2026 provided a remarkable convergence of a natural experiment on New Mexico’s Middle Rio Grande (a river and therefore irrigation system with little or no water) and the rapid advancement of what I’ve come to think of as “Curiosity Exploder Tools” (CETs, also more commonly known …
Continue reading ‘When people have less water, they seem to use less water’ »
Whiplash.
I took advantage of the break between Storm 2 and Storm 3 to wander the South Valley this morning. It was a great ride – lots of ditch banks, some weird urbanity (the Walmart parking lot where Frank Hubbell’s farm used to be, read our book to learn about the failed tobacco farming empire of …
My Utton Center posse is throwing a book launch party Friday (Sept. 25, 2026, 12:30 p.m.) at the Guild in Nob Hill. When we were conjuring up a title over the summer, we came up with “A conversation about the past, present, and future of Albuquerque’s Rio Grande,” which seemed to offer me lots of …
Updating my “drought and climate change” lecture each fall is a useful exercise – this year more useful than most. Much like the year itself, my slide deck is setting all time records for new data visualizations needed to make sense of the remarkable 2026. Update Great questions from the comments. (I love my commenters.) …
Continue reading ‘Making sense of the crazy outlier year of 2026’ »
My office mate and podcast hosting buddy Rin Tara had the good sense to pull out their phone and record some stuff while we were out at the Rio Grande Thursday, beneath the I40 bridge, waiting for the pulse flow to arrive. We had the good fortune to bump into Audubon’s Tucker Davidson when we …
Hitting “reload” and keeping track of six open browser tabs was making my head hurt – this helped. Back story here via Paul Tashjian, written as the pulse flow was getting underway: As I write, action is underfoot to combine water from the Albuquerque-Bernalillo County Water Utility Authority, the Middle Rio Grande Conservancy District and …
Continue reading ‘Visualizing the 2026 Albuquerque pulse flow’ »
At 2 p.m. Monday (Aug 31, 2026) the Albuquerque Bernalillo County Water Utility Authority, along with the Middle Rio Grande Conservancy District and Audubon Southwest, began releasing a pulse of water from Abiquiu Reservoir on the Rio Chama in Northern New Mexico as an experiment – what might a several day pulse of water do …