BOARD01250

• Board Meeting Date: 12/9/1964
• Description: Minutes
• Board Meetings - Doc Type: Meeting

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river that are shown on this chart, that is.
the dotted line indicates the river channel
itself. The visible channel is only a very
small portion but nevertheless this is the
river channel. Wells there take directly
from the river. The minute they go into oper-
ation the river flow starts diminishing and
goes back to replenish the underground with-
drawals. But you can't make any distinction
between the two types as far as the river is
concerned. It is one continuous body of
water, whether it is up here or right on the
river bank. The difference being that this
is the higher elevation and flows down to
the river. In either case it is one continu-
ous body of water and we say you cannot have
any type of administration which refuses to
recognize that fact; that we are dealing only
with one entity, one source of water, that is
replenished annually from the precipitation
which falls upon the land.

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You can drill wells through the bedrock
and hit other water-bearing formations where
we cannot determine any appreciable effect
upon the river level. So in a given area,
at a given spot, there can be two wells in
one small radius producing, one having a
determinable and definite effect on the river;
the other having no determinable effect on
the river. You can't define aquifers by
geographic considerations only. You have to
define them both by geographic and geologic
considerations, and this is part of the prob-
lem. But it is no mystery - there is nothing
mysterious about the workings of nature in
this respect at all. It takes a lot of work
but the subsurface Of the land can be
thoroughly mapped and we can predict and
determine the effects of the hydrologic cycle
in this valley. People will say you can't
determine it. Well, it can be determined. I
know if I dropped that pointer it would fall
and hit the ground. Water responds to the
same force; the force of gravity. This is the
reason it is easy to predict, if you do enough
geologic and hydrologic work in any given area.