WSPC07372

• File Number: 8040.950
• Description: Section D General Studies - General Water Studies
• State: CO
• Basin: Statewide
• Date: 9/1/1981
• Author: Colorado DNR
• Title: Colorado Water Study - Background Volume - Preliminary Review Draft - Report
• Water Supply Pro - Doc Type: Report/Study

001237

Dr aft - 9/81

consists of the area drained by the Gunnlson River and ali lts

tributarles upstream from the polnt of lts confluence wlth the

maIn stem of the Colorado at Grand Junctlon. .The Colorado Maln-

stem Region includes the Colorado River itself and the tribu-

taries which join it in Colorado other than the Gunnison. The

Northwest Reqion is drained by the Yampa and White Rivers and

their tributaries.

Appendix IX itemizes the major tributaries of

each river together with the large reservoirs in each region.

Because the boundariei of each region often cross county llnes,

county data were apportioned to individual regions as circum-

stances warranted.

The apportionment of various types of data to

each hydrologic region is outlined in Appendix X.

"Wi

Land Ownership and Management3

Approximately 59 percent of Colorado's land area is in pri-

vate hands or is owned by municipal or county governments; most

of the remainder is owned by the federal government.

~lost of

this 59 percent lies east of the Front Range or in the Rio Grande

Region.

There is relatively little federal land in the Platte

and Arkansas Hydrologic Regions, virtually none in the Northern

High Plains, and federal land in the Rio Grande Region is concen-

trated towards the west.

In the mountains and on the Western Slope,4 land held pri-

vately and by local government is scattered and constitutes a

much lower percentage of total land area than on the eastern

3Source: U. S. Bureau of Reclamation, 1974.
4From th is point land to the west of the Cant inental Div ide will
be called the Western Slope, to the east, the Eastern Slope.

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