Laserfiche WebLink
Water Supply Reserve Account - Grant Application Form <br />Fonn Revised May 2007 <br />type of public recreational benefit. <br />Our plan is to file for new water rights, such as on Heyborne and develop a large recharge project in <br />cooperation with the State of Colorado, SPWRAP, NAWCA, LSPWCD, and hopeftilly others including <br />the South Reservation Ditch. The project along with Heyborne, and adjacent landowner Kross will <br />compliment the Tamarack Ranch project currently being used as the centerpiece of the Platte River <br />Recovery Program. Our plan is to construct most of the infrastructure at the same time as we construct <br />Heyborne and Kross. The project should be up and operational by Spring 2009. We still have to file for <br />water rights, but recent analysis show that there is still substantial recharge water available during winter <br />months in this portion of the lower river. Although the project will be used to provide water for the <br />PRRIP, several interests from local irrigation districts and landowners in leasing available credits <br />unassociated with the PRRIP are being pursued. Using the engineering report from Heyborne and <br />planting for a project of four times the size we should be able to generate 160 acft to 350 acft per month <br />over an annual range. <br />DT RANCH <br />The DT Ranch is duck club located near Weldona, CO in Morgan County and has been operated as <br />such for nearly 90 years. Covering most of 2,000 acres in the riverbottom south of the South Platte River <br />the property is composed of river channel, warm-water sloughs, riparian corridor, and vast acreages of <br />irrigated farming and grazing land. The ranch employs a full-time manager that oversees agricultural <br />operations and wildlife management. In 2004, the DT Ranch sold a bargain sale conservation easement to <br />DU on 800 acres to protect the water rights on that property. Now nearly 500 acres of the ground can be <br />placed into recharge for the Fort Morgan Canal decree with a 75 day return time. As we have seen in <br />other similar projects, spring flooding for recharge provides exceptional habitat for spring migrating <br />waterfowl. <br />As part of the first easement, DT Ranch took the unprecidented step and changed their water rights <br />certificates to include DU as a co-owner of the water shares. Although our easements outline in detailed <br />uses for water encumbered with a DU conservation easement, taking the step to reissue certifiactes assures <br />the water will not be sold from the proeprty without DU's consent. We are now able to apply all twelve <br />shares of the water to flood irrigate wetlands and pasture for grazing and waterfowl needs. <br />Augmentation occurs on the property via the decree for Case W-2692 filed on May 19, 1972 (the <br />FMRICO Augmentation Plan) and entered by the court on December 3, 1974 and amended several <br />times. The DT Ranch entered into a long-term (99 years) agreement with the FMRICO on February <br />4, 2006 related to augmentation activities at the subject property. The original agreement between <br />the DT Ranch and the FMRICO was for a 20-year term and was executed on July 31, 1991. The <br />DT uses some of the accretions it generates under this augmentation plan to make up for gravel pit <br />lake depletions; however, the DT Ranch has historically had significant volumes of excess accretions <br />that DT Ranch would like to put to beneficial use. Excess accretions have averaged approximately <br />260 acre feet per year for the period from November 2000 through November 2007 for a total of <br />2,124 acre feet of water that could have been put to beneficial use on the ranch over this 7-year <br />16