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<br />Both Colorado and New Mexico recognize the doctrine of <br />prior appropriation, . . . and appropriative, as opposed to <br />riparian, rights depend on actual use, not land ownership. . . <br />. It follows, therefore, that the equitable apportionment of <br />appropriated [siel rights should turn on the benefits, harms, <br />and efficiencies of competing uses, and that the source ofthe <br />Vermejo River's waters should be essentially irrelevant to <br />the adjudication of these sovereigns' competing claims. <br /> <br />Whether the same conclusion would be reached where some or a 1 of the <br /> <br />contesting states apply the riparian doctrine is debatable. <br /> <br />Contemporaneously with its Vermejo decisions, the Court held inldaho . Oregon <br /> <br /> <br />and Washington, 462 U.S. 1017 (1983), that the doctrine of equitable apportio <br /> <br />applicable to a dispute among the three states over their respective shares of the <br /> <br />anadromous fish in the Columbia-Snake River System. The basic principle it pplied <br /> <br />was that "states have an affirmative duty under the doctrine of equitable apporti nment <br /> <br />to take reasonable steps to conserve and even to augment the natural resource within <br /> <br />their borders for the benefit of other states." ld. at 1025 (emphasis added). <br /> <br />Most recently, the Court concluded in Nebraska v. Wyoming, 515 U.S. 1, 11-13 <br /> <br />(1995), that it is appropriate in an equitable apportionment case to consider evidence of <br /> <br />impacts of an upstream state's proposed actions on downstream "wildlife and ildlife <br /> <br />habitat" and related "environmental injury:" <br /> <br />The Court in other interstate water cases not involving equitable apportionme <br /> <br /> <br />recognized a state's duty (1) to protect other states against floods resulting from a ificial <br /> <br />changes in an upstream watershed, North Dakota v. Minnesota, 263 U.S. 36 ,374 <br /> <br />17 <br />