9351

• UCREFRP Catalog Number: 9351
• Author: Hobbs, G.
• Title: Water For Recreation, Water Quality, and Wetlands".
• USFW Year: 1990.
• USFW - Doc Type: \
• Copyright Material: NO

Recreation Area (C-BT Project) and Cueracanti-Blue Mesa National
Recreation Area (Wayne Aspinall unit). An essential component of
the State Parks recreational program is centered on reservoirs,
such as Boyd Lake, Jackson Lake, Chatfield Reservoir, and Cherry
Creek Reservoir. The Division of Wildlife holds a variety of
water rights for fish hatcheries, ponds, and impoundments. Most
of the highly prized stream fisheries in the State are situated
below reservoirs, such as Ruedi, Spinney Mountain, and McPhee.
Boating is made possible in Colorado largely through reservoirs,
since the State's natural lakes are neither large nor numerous
enough to support the demand for sailing, canoeing, and
motorboating activities enjoyed by Colorado citizens and
tourists. Moreover, floatboating and kayaking in streams after
Spring snowmelt is largely made possible by releases of water
from storage, for example, Green Mountain Reservoir into the
Colorado River and Twin Lakes Reservoir into the Arkansas River.
Recreational benefits occur as the stored water is conveyed and
delivered to its downstream municipal or agricultural use. The
public at large, as well as commercial rafting operations, have
been beneficiaries of the stored water resource, generally
without charge or with only a nominal charge.
It has become routine for new appropriations and
changes of water rights (direct flow as well as storage rights)
to be decreed for recreational use. While decrees confirming
recreation as a beneficial use have heretofore largely been
entered in the context of reservoirs, the release of water from
storage and its administration through the stream channel to a
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