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` Maximum gauged flow rates for the water years 1976, 1977 and 1973 were <br />1160, 100 and 1230 cfs, respectively, and occurred in May of each year. <br />Minimum gaged flows were 29 cfs in August of 1976, 5.8 cfs in July of <br />1977, and 29 cfs in October of 1978. <br />Figure 2.7-14 gives the discharge and suspended sediment of the Williams <br />Fork River near its mouth for water year 1979. The discharge for the 1979 <br />water year is close to the mean hydrograph in Figure 2.7-13. Sediment <br />concentrations during the snow melt season were much higher in the Williams <br />Fork than the Yampa for smaller discharges. Baseflow concentrations of <br />suspended sediment were similar for both rivers. <br />• Water from the Yampa River Basin is used for irrigated cropland, municipal <br />water supplies, stock ponds, cooling water for power plants, evapotrans- <br />piration by riparian vegetation and phreatophytes, and transbasin diversions. <br />Irrigation of cropland constitutes the largest of these uses. Surface water <br />withdrawn from the Yampa River valley in 1976 totaled approximately 445,000 <br />ac -ft. Of that, nearly 399,000 ac -ft were used for irrigating croplands <br />and hay meadows or was stored in stock ponds. Other uses included 5,478 <br />ac -ft for industrial purposes, 2,555 ac -ft for municipal water supplies, <br />and 8,283 ac -ft for other unspecified uses (Steele et al, 1979). Industrial <br />consumption has since increased by 18,720 ac-ft/yr due to use by the Craig <br />generating station. <br />[dater for agricultural irrigation is generally obtained by simple stream di- <br />version structures and networks of ditches for flooding grasslands and meadows <br />2-409 <br />