WSP01908

• File Number: 8278.300
• Description: Title I - Merxican Deliveries
• Basin: Colorado Mainstem
• Date: 2/1/1963
• Author: USDOI/BOR
• Title: Special Studies - Delivery of Water to Mexico
• Water Supply Pro - Doc Type: Publication

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Valley Irrigation District, the Government turned th~ operation and'

maintenance of the system over to the water users and this area liaS

e11m1nated from the Yuma Project.

In March 1910, 6,975 acres of the Reservation Division vere

opened to homesteading and vere sUbsequently called the Bard

District. Irrigation service commenced with the completion of

Laguna Dam and the Yuma Main Canal. Af'ter completion of the Colorado

River siphon in 1912, irrigation service in the Valley Division liaS

provided through the Yuma Main Canal also. Laguna Dam was the point

of river diversion for the Yuma Project until the completion of

Imperial Dam in 1938. Shortly thereaf'ter, deliveries to the Yuma

Main Canal and the Reservation Division laterals were made through

the All-AJnerican Canal.

The need for project drainage was evident !'rom the beginning.

The Reservation main drain liaS constructed in 1912. Drainage

surveys vere started in the Valley Division in 1915. In 1917 the

pumping of drainage water into the Colorado River was cOllllllenc,ed.

In 1924 the discharge of drainage water through the 130undary

Pumping Plant across the Sonora land boundary to Mexico was

canmenced.

The Valley Division has an irrigable area of 51,936 acres, of

loIbich 45,149 acres w.s irrigated in 1961. The 'oI8.ter supply ineluded.

353,120 acre-feet of Colorado River lIater and 16,728 acre-feet !'roma

drainage recovery.

or the 14,260 irrigab1e acres in the Reservation Division,

10,960 acres were irrigated in 1961.

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