WSP06331 - Laserfiche WebLink

Home Browse Search

History The settlement of the Arkansas River basin in Colorado and Kansas followed the usual frontier pattern. First came the explorers, then the trappers and traders, next the herdsmen, and finally, the permanent agricultural settlers. The number and size of settlements in the region grew after the Pikes Peak gold rush in the late 1850's, which increased the demand for agricultural production. Thus began the era of irrigated agriculture in the Arkansas River valley and the allocation of the water resources in the basin. In Colorado, the earliest priority for a water right in the basin was recorded in the spring of 1859. During the 1860's, priorities were established and diversion ditches were constructed in the headwater areas; however, it was not until 1874, in the vicinity of Rocky Ford, Colo., that large-scale irrigation began. Major appropriations of streamflow were developed between 1880 and 1910, creating a need for storage reservoirs. Consequently, irrigation companies began building off-channel reservoirs to store winter and early spring runoff for later use. In Kansas, during the early 1880's, several irrigation canals were constructed to divert water from the Arkansas River; however, expansion of surface-water irrigation in Kansas was hindered because diversions in eastern Colorado made streamflow insufficient and unreliable for extensive irrigation development. In the late 1880's, farmers began using windmills to pump ground water for irrigation. In 1908, centrifugal pumps were introduced, and the area irrigated by ground water gradually was increased. The irrigation water supply in the Arkansas River valley has always been subject to large annual and seasonal fluctuations. To regulate these fluctua- tions, a number of irrigation companies have constructed off-channel reservoirs to store winter and early spring flows for later productive use. During 1880 through 1910, storage rights were established to permit the yearly diversion of almost 500,000 acre-ft of Arkansas River water to off-channel reservoirs. In 1943, the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers completed construction of the John Martin Reservoir in Colorado on the Arkansas River east of Las Animas; and in 1975, the U.S. Bureau of Reclamation completed construction of Pueblo Reservoir on the Arkansas River west of Pueblo, Colo. These two reservoirs, which have a combined storage capacity of about 1 million acre-ft, are multi- use facilities that provide benefits such as flood control, irrigation, wildlife enhancement, and recreation. Water development in the basin was not restricted to agricultural purposes. Municipal and industrial water users established decrees and developed diversion and storage systems of their own to supply potable water. As communities increased in population and as agriculture expanded in the 1920's, ditch companies and municipalities began to consider the Colorado River basin, west of the Continental Divide, as a source of unallocated water. By 1935, seven projects had been constructed to import water into the Arkansas River basin. In 1971, the U.S. Bureau of Reclamation completed the Boustead Tunnel in Colorado, a facility of the Fryingpan-Arkansas Project. Since then, the project has imported an average of about 44,000 acre-ft of water per year from the Colorado River basin into the Arkansas River basin near Leadville. The project is designed to import a long-term average of about 69,000 acre-ft per year. 8