Megadrought in U.S. Southwest: A Bad Omen for Forests Globally

by caroline fraser

As brutal fires torch tinder-dry dense forests and neighboring homes in the American West, researchers are examining the relationships between drought, wildfire, and a warming climate, predicting mass forest die-offs and prolonged megadrought for the Southwest. These forces are accelerating, they say, and already transforming the landscape. Unchecked, they may permanently destroy forests in the southwestern U.S. and in some other regions around the world.

Across the West, “megafires” have become the norm. With climbing temperatures, after a century of fire suppression, the total area burned has tripled since the 1970s, and the average annual number of fires over 10,000 acres is seven times what it was then. Fighting and suppressing fires costs more than $3 billion a year, not to mention lives lost. So understanding what, if anything, can be done to reduce intense forest fires has assumed an urgent priority.

Currently suffering the worst drought in the U.S., New Mexico has emerged as a “natural experiment” in megadrought, a laboratory for understanding drought’s deep history in the region — and what might lay in store in an era of rapid, human-caused warming.

With a highly variable climate, the Southwest boasts perhaps the best-studied megadrought history in the world. It’s the home of dendrology, the science of studying tree-rings, first developed at the University of Arizona. The pronounced seasonality of hot summers followed by cold winters produces well-defined rings, while archaeological fascination with Southwestern cultures — Chaco Canyon, Mesa Verde, and other sites where ancient peoples flourished and disappeared — has supported the collection and study of centuries of tree-ring data. Temperate-zone trees lay down wider rings in wet years, which narrow or vanish during drought. What’s more, rings can be precisely dated, with sets matched against each other, revealing burn scars and patterns of climate, precipitation, drought stress, and tree mortality.

Park Williams, a young bioclimatologist and postdoctoral fellow at Los Alamos National Laboratory, has teamed up with other specialists at the U.S. Geological Survey (USGS) and the University of Arizona to wring new insight from the data set spanning the years 1000 to 2007. Driving recently into the Jemez Mountains near his office, we pass rust-red pines, dead or dying from drought. Later, kneeling next to a freshly cut stump, he points to a ring near the bark. “That thick ring right there is probably 1998,” he says, a wetter El Niño year.

Armed with 13,147 such site-specific cross-sectioned specimens, gathered from more than 300 sites, Williams and his co-authors devised a new “forest drought-stress index,” integrating tree-ring measurements with climatalogical and historical records for a paper published earlier this year in Nature Climate Change. Winter precipitation has long been thought important to tree growth, but another key variable leapt from this fresh examination of the data, related to a warmer, dryer climate: the average vapor pressure deficit during summer and fall, which is driven by temperature. As air grows warmer, its capacity to hold water vapor increases exponentially, which speeds evaporation and sucks more moisture out of trees’ leaves or needles, as well as the soil itself.

If the vapor pressure deficit sucks out enough moisture, it kills trees, and there’s been a lot of that going on. Looking back in time through the tree rings, Williams determined that the current Southwest drought, beginning in 2000, is the fifth most severe since AD 1000, set against similarly devastating megadroughts that have occurred regularly in the region. One struck during the latter 1200s (probably driving people from the region) and another in 1572-1587, a drought that stretched across the continent to Virginia and the Carolinas. Few conifers abundant in the Southwest — including piñon, ponderosa pine, and Douglas fir — survived that latter event, despite lifespans approaching 800 years; those species have since regrown.

The forest drought stress index correlates strongly with these periods, while 20th-century temperature records show a connection between drought and tree mortality associated with huge wildfires and bark-beetle outbreaks, such as the devastating ones of the past two decades. Williams’ study is also supported by satellite fire data from the past few decades, revealing an exponential relationship between drought stress and areas killed by wildfire.

His projections, based on climate forecasts, sparked grim headlines throughout the region: If the climate warms as expected, forests in the Southwest will be suffering regularly from drought stress by 2050 at levels exceeding previous megadroughts. After 2050, he calculates, 80 percent of years will exceed those levels. “The majority of forests in the Southwest probably cannot survive in the temperatures that are projected,” he says.

Making matters worse in the near-term, forests hit by so-called “stand-destroying” wildfires may not recover. During a recent phone interview, Craig Allen, a co-author of the Nature paper and a USGS research ecologist at the Jemez Mountain Field Station near Los Alamos, explains that the catastrophically hot fires seen recently in New Mexico, while a natural result of a century of fire suppression and dense growth during wet periods, create conditions for permanent forest loss through “type conversion.” Basically, high severity fires that burn over a wide area subvert the ability of southwestern conifers to reproduce, a process requiring nearby mother trees to drop their seeds. Ponderosa pines, for example, can’t cast their seed much more than 100 yards, virtually ensuring that large forest gaps will be replaced by shrub and grasslands, with unfortunate consequences for a range of forest services, particularly those provided by delicate watersheds. “These anomalously big patches where every tree is killed create a high risk that they won’t come back as forests,” Allen says.

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Tombstone readies picks and shovels

The City of Tombstone is embroiled in another dynamic showdown.

The “Town too Tough to Die” is now squaring off against the U.S. Forest Service in what could be the fight of its life, a battle over water rights.

On Friday and Saturday, a group called the Shovel Brigade will gather in Tombstone and head to the Huachuca Mountains to make repairs to the city’s waterline, which was damaged by mudslides and boulders after last summer’s Monument Fire flooding. While the 26-mile waterline — fed by springs in the Huachuca Mountains — has been Tombstone’s main water source for 130 years, the U.S. Forest Service is refusing to allow mechanized equipment into areas to make the repairs. Citing the Wilderness Act, the forest service is concerned about environmental damage that heavy equipment could cause to wilderness areas while excavation work and rebuilding are underway.

“Twenty four springs and one reservoir located in the Huachuca Mountains make up our water supply,” said George Barnes, Tombstone’s city clerk. “We’ve been allowed to make repairs to three of the springs, but we have a long way to go before the entire water system is rebuilt. There are sections of the line that mudslides have buried under 12 feet of debris, and the forest service is requiring us to make the repairs by hand, using picks and shovels.”

That’s where the Shovel Brigade comes in. After learning about the city’s dilemma, communities across the country have been sending shovels to Tombstone, some bearing signatures and messages of support. To date, more than 500 shovels have arrived in Tombstone. And on Friday, around 1,000 people are expected to gather at the old high school football field off Fremont Street to raise public awareness about the city’s water issue. In addition, volunteers will be traveling to the Huachuca Mountains to work on the waterline, making repairs by hand, as stipulated by the forest service.

“We’ve received almost no cooperation from the federal government on this issue,” said Tombstone’s former mayor Jack Henderson, who was in the mountains doing excavation work on the line when agents ordered him to leave.

“Our story has been picked up by CNN, Fox, Rush Limbaugh, John Stossel and the Washington Examiner, not to mention towns all over the country. The Goldwater Institute has joined our fight and is representing us in court.”

In August, Gov. Jan Brewer declared a state of emergency and provided funds to help with the aqueduct’s repairs.

While the forest service has allowed Tombstone access to three of its springs, the city has not been allowed to work on the remaining 21.

U.S. Rep. Jeff Flake is currently sponsoring federal legislation that will allow Tombstone to repair the damaged water lines without going though federal permits.

In addition, Tombstone Archivist Nancy Sosa has been requested to testify before the House Natural Resources Committee on Friday regarding Flake’s bill and the challenges Tombstone has been facing.

The town’s 26-mile, gravity-fed system was built in the 1880s as the Huachuca Water Company and has been hailed “an engineering marvel.” An article that appears in an 1882 edition of the Tombstone Epitaph talks about the pipeline and its route from Miller, Marshall and Carr Canyons as it makes its way to Tombstone. In 1908 the Huachuca Water Company was purchased by A.E. Davis who sold the entire water system to the City of Tombstone in 1947. In addition, the city owns original documents showing every appropriation of the water system, with the first appropriation from Miller Canyon in 1881.

“The city’s ownership of this system predates statehood and the forest service,” said Tombstone City Councilman Steve Troncale.

“Each appropriation of water comes with a land description and map indicating the city of Tombstone owns the water rights. All of this is court ordered through sales and a declaration of ownership of property to Tombstone.”

Through the years, the system has provided an ample supply of potable water to the residents of Tombstone, along with the 400,000 tourists that visit the town annually. But now, the town is left with three repaired springs, along with one reliable well for its water. With fire season here, the ability to provide adequate water for fire suppression is a concern.

“In my opinion, the forest service has made several mistakes,” said Kevin Rudd, who was hired by Tombstone as project manager for the system’s repair work. “The first and obvious one is forest mismanagement that put Tombstone in this predicament in the first place.”

Rudd said that once the damage was done, the forest service should have allowed Tombstone into the wilderness area to “repair our system which would facilitate Tombstone’s obligation to protect its residents. Instead, they used the Wilderness Act as a tool to delay our repair process.”

Rudd also noted that the city of Tombstone began contacting the forest service about
accessing damaged areas to start the repairs “long before the situation was declared an emergency” by Brewer.

“When monsoon rains began to pound the canyons in July of 2011, Nancy Sosa began contacting the forest service to let them know about our pending dilemma because she knew from experience what was coming.”

Rudd disagrees with U.S. District Judge Frank Zapata’s recent decision to deny the city’s emergency request to repair the water system. Zapata’s decision is based on the argument that “repairs to the system appear to be substantially complete.”

Those repairs, Rudd argues, are preliminary, with temporary welds holding salvaged pipe in place where the main aqueduct was blown out. Collection structures, once made of concrete and protected by metal cages were destroyed during the mudslides and are now made of temporary sand bags and plastic pipe.

“Our situation right now is precarious,” said Barnes. “If our one well goes down, or we receive minimal flow from the springs, we’re in a very bad situation.”

However, Zapata does not feel that Tombstone faces a crisis. “Claims of a drastic water emergency related to public consumption and fire needs are overstated and speculative,” he has been quoted as stating.

Troncale points to a huge restaurant fire that occurred in Tombstone about 18 months ago where the establishment, Six Gun City, burned to the ground. The fire, he said, could have destroyed the entire town.

“It was our water supply, fire department and the backup that we got from other fire districts that saved this town from complete disaster,” he said.

“The supply of water that we have right now is not adequate to fight a fire of that magnitude. If we have another fire like Six Gun City’s, this entire town could be
destroyed.”

During a special Cochise County Board of Supervisors meeting on Tuesday, the board unanimously supported a resolution that calls for “…the cooperation of the U.S. Forest Service in the repair and maintenance of its (Tombstone’s) municipal water
system.”

The supervisors’ support came as welcome news to Tombstone officials, said Barnes. In part, the resolution states that the forest service has impaired the ability of agents of the city of Tombstone “to make repairs to its water system by restricting access…” to the system. Concerns about the health and safety of the residents of Tombstone, along with its visitors also are noted.

In addition, the resolution supports Tombstone’s right to “immediate and unimpaired access to Coronado National Forest lands located in the Huachuca Mountains, free of federal restraint to make all necessary repairs to its water
system.”

Tombstone city officials are hoping the publicity the town has been receiving, along with legislative support, will generate enough public pressure to allow the work to be completed without further delays.

“Our beef is with the forest service, not the forest,” said Barnes. “We want to re-establish what we already had.”

Henderson agrees. “With the monsoons just around the corner, we’re bracing for more damage,” he said.

“The Tombstone Shovel Brigade is just another layer of support we’ve received in this convoluted process. The good news is, we’ve already won this fight in the court of public opinion, and the state of Arizona recognizes our rights. Now we need to do is convince the federal government.”

NM ranchers: Venture threatens to leave area dry

Ray Pittman pulled his 1994 F-150 pickup to the top of a thinly wooded hill, a short walk from the water tank he built back in 1999 on his 1,300-acre ranch.

A mile down the hill, Pittman's 540-foot-deep well pumps groundwater, pushing it up to the tank to provide for cattle on this remote patch of central New Mexico landscape.

To the west, on the vast plain that makes up the Augustin Plains Ranch, a commercial venture has proposed sinking 37 wells to pump groundwater and pipe it to the Rio Grande Valley to supplement dwindling water supplies of central New Mexico's farms and cities.

The Augustin Plains Ranch proposal would move 54,000 acre-feet per year of water to the Rio Grande Basin 50 miles away — enough water to meet the needs of a city the size of Albuquerque.

In their application to the state, project backers were not specific about how the water would be used. The group declined repeated requests to provide further information.

But it appears to be aimed at making up for a water shortfall in the rapidly growing Rio Grande Valley, either through direct use or replacing water removed from the Rio Grande by municipal or industrial users upstream.

Those in the central New Mexico ranch country where the water would start its journey fear the project would leave them high and dry.

Pittman and his wife, Carol, use a second well to provide water to two ranch houses, three horses, two donkeys, "six or seven cats," one dog and nine goldfish that call one of the stock tanks home.

"People are afraid that this will deplete the aquifer," said Carol Pittman. "We all have wells."

The proposal would "essentially dry up the whole damn basin," said Albuquerque hydrologist Frank Titus. Water would disappear from wells, said Titus, who investigated the issue on behalf of the Pittmans and other residents of the ranching community. He said he has received no financial compensation for his work.

The Augustin Plains Ranch proposal and a similar project in eastern New Mexico, which would send water from the Fort Sumner area to Santa Fe, reflect entrepreneurial attempts to deal with a glaring New Mexico water problem.

The most detailed analysis, done for the New Mexico Interstate Stream Commission in 2004, found residents of New Mexico's Middle Rio Grande Valley are using water at an unsustainable rate, consuming water faster than nature replenishes it.

Albuquerque and Santa Fe have in the past few years started using water imported from the Colorado River Basin via the San Juan-Chama Project, reducing their dependence on unsustainable groundwater pumping.

Cities also have been pushed to make up some of the shortfall by buying up agricultural water rights in the Rio Grande Valley and taking the land out of production to reduce irrigation use.

To meet all municipal water needs would require taking nearly all the valley's agricultural land out of farming and shifting the water to city use, according to an analysis by the state Interstate Stream Commission.

The search for alternatives has led to the proposals to pump water from rural New Mexico into the Rio Grande Valley.

"There's no question in my mind that at some point there may be a need to augment the Middle Rio Grande by bringing in some bulk water from somewhere," State Engineer John D'Antonio said.

The proposals raise the specter of the Owens Valley, the California area dried up early in the 20th century to bring water to Los Angeles. Taking that water devastated the Owens Valley, D'Antonio said.

For now, D'Antonio, whose office administers New Mexico water rights, has said no. In a ruling earlier this year, D'Antonio turned down the Fort Sumner proposal. The group proposing the pipeline has appealed.

Attorneys involved in the case say the law cited in D'Antonio's decision is likely to apply to the Augustin Plains Ranch proposal. But the legal argument behind the decision is narrow, leaving open the possibility the proposal could return.

There are significant differences between the proposals.

The Fort Sumner proposal at 6,425 acre-feet of water per year involves about one-eighth the amount proposed to be pumped from the basin adjacent to the Pittmans' ranch.

The Fort Sumner proposal also involves existing groundwater pumping rights being used to irrigate farm land, said Ron Green, the Roswell rancher behind the project. The Augustin Plains Ranch wants to create new water rights with its 37 wells.

But the chief complaint against both projects is similar — that pumping water from rural areas to meet demand in New Mexico's cities will reduce the water available to communities left behind.

Green says the Fort Sumner project was designed to protect the water rights and economy of the Pecos River Valley, where the water will originate. The project has been structured to take only groundwater from farms in a way that won't affect the rights of other water users, Green said.

Steve Hernandez, the attorney who represents Pecos Valley irrigators who oppose the project, says the project poses the risk of upsetting the delicate water rights balance in the valley.

The project has a fatal flaw, according to D'Antonio's decision: Green has not identified who, specifically, will be using the water.

State water law requires an identified "beneficial use" on the receiving end, D'Antonio ruled. Without knowing who will use the water, where and how, the state cannot approve the application, D'Antonio ruled.

The argument used in the Fort Sumner ruling appears to apply to the Augustin Plains Ranch proposal, said Bruce Frederick of the New Mexico Environmental Law Center, who represents the Pittmans and other opponents.

The Augustin Plains Ranch proposal submitted in 2008 simply says the water can be used for any purpose anywhere in the portions of Catron, Sierra, Socorro, Valencia, Bernalillo, Sandoval and Santa Fe counties that lie in the Rio Grande Basin.

That falls short of the requirement to specify a "beneficial use," said Frederick.

The proposal amounts to an "attempt to monopolize a water supply for purposes of speculation and possible future water sales," Frederick wrote in a brief filed in the case.

There has been no decision in the case. But observers note both projects could overcome the current legal hurdle by signing up and identifying users, starting the legal discussions anew.

NM pushes changes to outstanding waters proposal

The New Mexico Environment Department and conservation groups presented a compromise Tuesday to state regulators who are considering a proposal that would protect hundreds of miles of headwater streams, more than two dozen lakes and numerous wetlands in federal wilderness areas around New Mexico.

The department first petitioned the Water Quality Control Commission to designate headwaters in a dozen federal wilderness areas around the state as outstanding water sources, which would protect streams, lakes and wetlands by prohibiting any activities that would degrade water quality.

Under the compromise, temporary degradation of water quality would be allowed only in limited circumstances, such as during restoration or maintenance projects.

Supporters said the compromise better defines protections for outstanding waters and keeps in place the state's strict anti-degradation policy. But it immediately drew criticism from a ranchers' group that has been fighting the department's effort to designate the waterways as "outstanding national resources waters."

Dan Dolan, an attorney representing the New Mexico Cattle Growers' Association, said suggesting changes to the proposal during the hearing process does not give ranchers or others who are concerned enough time to review and present their cases.

"We have the agency changing its proposal to be something that it never was in the first place and that the public never got notice of," he said. "It's just another example of an environmental agency that does not really care what the public's input is."

State officials said they have tried to address the public's concerns and that development of the initial proposal included extensive public participation.

The hearing before the commission in Santa Fe is a continuation of a proceeding that started last month. Some groups involved in the case have been negotiating changes to the proposal's language over the last three weeks, but the ranchers contend that they were left out.

The hearing was scheduled to last through Friday. It will be up to the commission to approve, modify or reject the proposal. It could be December before the commission makes a final decision in the case.

"The cattle growers are just slowing the process down and stalling it as much as they can," said Bryan Bird of WildEarth Guardians, one of the groups that negotiated the compromise. "The bottom line is that a handful of public lands ranchers are holding the entire state's clean water hostage. I think that's inappropriate."

Pointing to citizens' signatures and support from municipalities and sportsmen's groups, Bird said protecting New Mexico's headwaters will help the state prepare for growing pressure on its limited water resources.

The Richardson administration began pushing an outstanding waters designation in 2008.

After dozens of public meetings, the environment department changed its proposal a few times to address the concerns of ranchers, water associations and others. It wasn't until May that the state presented its final petition to the commission.

Water Proposal Puts Pressure on N.M. Regulators

By Susan Montoya Bryan
Associated Press

New Mexico regulators listened to testimony Thursday from an environmental group that wants more protections than what state officials are proposing for headwater streams, lakes and wetlands across the state, while critics continued to hold out hope for intervention from the state's highest court.

The New Mexico Supreme Court cleared the way for the hearing to begin in Santa Fe earlier this week. But an attorney for the New Mexico Cattle Growers' Association said the court has yet to issue a final ruling on whether the state Environment Department's petition to designate the streams and lakes in a dozen wilderness areas as "outstanding national resource waters" meets regulations.

The court struck down a temporary restraining order so the hearing could begin, but it also requested the ranchers' group to file a response by Sept. 24.

Dan Dolan, an Albuquerque attorney who represents the group, told The Associated Press during a break in the hearing that he hopes the court's action means it will take a closer look at the state's proposal.

"It has been a moving target. They've changed it three separate times," Dolan said, adding that the public has not been given an adequate chance to comment on the latest version of the petition.

Supporters said they don't expect the court to interrupt the ongoing proceedings.

"I highly doubt that the Supreme Court would condone an attempt by a disgruntled party to silence the public's right to speak out in favor of clean water before an agency has even reached a decision. That would be quite the injustice," said Erik Schlenker-Goodrich of the Western Environmental Law Center.

The Richardson administration began pushing an outstanding waters designation in 2008. It would protect streams, lakes and wetlands by prohibiting any activities that would degrade water quality.

The first plan called for protecting all waters — even those that flow intermittently — in wilderness and roadless areas around the state. That was scaled back after concerns were raised during 11 public meetings and after state lawmakers came out in opposition.

More changes were made after a second round of public meetings last fall, and it wasn't until May that the state presented its final petition to the Water Quality Control Commission.

State officials testified this week that they have tried to address the public's concerns — including those of the ranchers' group and some water associations — and that development of the petition has been the most extensive public participation process the department has under taken for any water quality initiative.

Sen. Phil Griego, D-San Jose, accused the department of going against the Legislature's intention by proceeding with the petition. More public meetings need to be held and the commission, which is appointed by the governor, should not be making decisions that have the potential to impact so many of the state's residents, he said.

"That's not right. The Legislature is the one that's empowered to do that type of stuff," Griego said.

The group WildEarth Guardians asked the commission Thursday to go beyond what the state was proposing and approve an amendment that would add 450,000 acres of adjacent roadless areas to the outstanding waters designation. The group contends those lands are also ecologically important.

The state's petition calls for designating as outstanding about 700 miles of rivers and streams, 29 lakes and more than 4,900 acres of wetlands in a dozen wilderness areas. The amendment would add another 800 miles of waterways.

Critics argued that the proposal is already too broad and that waters should be considered on an individual basis.

Dolan was also concerned about a letter sent to the commission by U.S. Forest Service regional officials days before the hearing said it was changing its position and would not be opposing the petition after all. The agency — which would be responsible for managing the headwaters under an outstanding designation — earlier questioned the accuracy of the state's maps and lack of water quality data for many of the nominated waters.

The Forest Service declined to immediately comment on the letter.

Dolan said ranchers and others who have Forest Service permits need to know how the agency plans to implement management practices in wilderness areas before an outstanding waters designation is approved.

"The cattle growers are not saying that we don't believe ONRW has value. What we're really saying is that we don't believe interjecting the U.S. Forest Service in this process makes a lot of sense," he said. "This could have a critical impact on a lot of livelihoods."

NM Ranchers Worry About Water Protection Proposal

Thousands of miles of New Mexico rivers and streams would gain special protection under the federal Clean Water Act as part of a proposal being pushed by Gov. Bill Richardson and environmentalists. But ranchers worry the plan is a backdoor effort to stop grazing on public land.

State environment officials have spent more than two years refining a proposal to designate rivers and streams in wilderness areas across the state as so-called "outstanding national resource waters" to protect them from degradation.

Other Western states have used the designation to protect fresh water resources, but this marks the first time New Mexico has embarked on such a broad effort to protect headwaters.

"One of our biggest challenges in New Mexico is figuring out how to protect and maintain our water resources in a way that is sustainable and economically supportable, and these are not easy decisions to make," Marcy Leavitt, head of the New Mexico Environment Department's Water and Wastewater Division, told a group of landowners at a recent public meeting in Abiquiu.

Like other states, Leavitt said New Mexico is dealing with persistent drought, hotter temperatures and a booming population — all drastically impacting fresh water supplies.

New Mexico's largest cities are switching to surface water as ground water resources dwindle. Much of that includes treated wastewater that's pumped into rivers by communities upstream.

The headwaters offer the last remaining infusion of fresh water into the system, meaning their protection is vital to ensure future water quality, Leavitt said.

No one disputes the need to protect New Mexico's water, but ranchers see the plan to designate waterways across such a broad swath of wilderness — far from pollution and cities — as another ploy by environmentalists in a decades-long battle to halt grazing on national forest lands.

"This whole thing with the Clean Water Act, it's just a front. They want our land, they want our water, period," said Carlos Salazar of the Northern New Mexico Stockman's Association.

The designation would allow existing activities, including grazing, to continue in wilderness areas provided landowners follow practices to ensure water quality remains high.

But ranchers say the proposal is ambiguous and would establish new layers of bureaucracy that would harm New Mexico's rural economy.

"People are very worried," said Caren Cowan, executive director of the New Mexico Cattle Growers' Association. "Given that the wilderness areas are already protected from everything but grazing and recreational activities, what are we going to protect it from?"

The designation has been used only twice in New Mexico — for the Rio Santa Barbara and for rivers within the Valle Vidal. Such designations usually come after much analysis of water quality and potential socio-economic impacts.

Critics say little study has been done on the many waterways that would be covered and neither the Environment Department nor the U.S. Forest Service — which oversees wilderness areas — has the staff or funding necessary for adequate enforcement.

The Forest Service's Southwest regional office, livestock groups and officials from some New Mexico counties have said they do not support a blanket designation.

"A forest-by-forest, watershed-by-watershed or, best of all, a segment-by-segment analysis and designation of streams would allow for the most meaningful and fully supported designation of the appropriate waters," the Forest Service said in comments submitted to the state.

Forest Service officials are concerned the designation could affect firefighting efforts, forest restoration projects, mining claims, grazing permits and rural communities.

While the current proposal would apply to headwaters in wilderness areas, ranchers said more allotments could be affected because the Richardson administration and environmentalists have indicted they will pursue an expanded designation to include roadless areas.

Ernie Torres, whose family raises cattle in northern New Mexico, said ranchers already deal with pressure from environmentalists, endangered species concerns, drought, rising costs and range damage from wildlife.

"This is going to be the last nail in the coffin," he said.

The Environment Department is drafting a final version of the proposal for consideration by the state Water Quality Control Commission.

If approved, Abiquiu rancher Virgil Trujillo said cattlemen won't have many options.

"Our history is the history of take and take some more, and what hurts is government is not accountable," he said. "There are a thousand rules of how they're going to nail the rancher, but you try to take the government to court and you'll die of old age or stress."

Cowan said such a broad designation eventually could affect urban areas.

"Can subdivisions exist or grow? And what kind of city expansion can we do if a very small special interest group gains control over water?" she said. "These people have a very specific agenda and we're just a small part of it."

Environmentalists argue they're protecting water quality amid climate change and growing demand.

"A lot of people just don't like having somebody tell them what they can or can't do, but they're using public lands for these activities and I think they ought to accept the fact that the public has a right, as well as they do, to make sure that all of the land, for all purposes, is kept as good as possible," said Michael Jensen of Amigos Bravos.

Despite the cool reception state officials have received at public meetings in rural New Mexico, Leavitt has tried to reassure ranchers and others that the designation won't affect existing activities if water quality is maintained.

She said those who think this is an effort to push them off public land should read the proposal.

"The existing proposal does a good job of balancing water quality protection with also protecting traditional land uses, and I think we will make any clarifications necessary to make sure people really understand that's what we're doing," she said.

The Clean Water Act and Nonpoint Source Pollution: Implications for Western Agriculture

By Loretta Singletary

Extension Educator, University of Nevada Cooperative Extension

Introduction

Nevada is the driest state in the nation. Total average annual precipitation is approximately nine inches per year. Surface water in Nevada is limited and provides approximately 60 percent of the state's total water supply. The remaining 40 percent of water supplies are provided by ground water. Some areas in Nevada depend upon ground water supplies for 100 percent of their water.

Over the past few decades there has been a significant increase in litigation surrounding western water resources, including Nevada's watersheds. Agriculture has been named as a defendant in several cases. Those involved in agriculture need to acknowledge that water, a primary input in the production process, has become a highly valued and increasingly scarce resource. And, federal legislation prioritizes the improvement and protection of water quality involving water resources nationwide.

Farmers and ranchers must understand water issues surrounding agricultural activities and social concerns involving water bodies located near their operations.

The first step in accomplishing this level of awareness is to understand federal and state laws regulating water quality, implementation of laws and pollutants identified as harmful to water bodies. This fact sheet explains the provisions outlined in the Clean Water Act that specifically address nonpoint source pollution and implications for agriculture.

The Clean Water Act

The Clean Water Act (CWA) regulates water quality for the U.S. pertaining to surface waters such as rivers, streams and lakes as well as groundwater, wetlands, and urban runoff. Originally the CWA focused on point sources of water pollution but was amended in 1987 to provide for nonpoint source (NPS) pollution control.

Point sources of pollution are identifiable, confined means for transporting and discharging pollutants, such as channels, ditches, conduits and tunnels. Municipal treatment facilities, manufacturing industries and large animal confinement operations are examples of potential point sources of pollution. In contrast, NPS pollution is the scattered discharge of natural and manmade pollutants into the natural environment. As defined by the CWA,

NPS pollution derives from diffuse, unregulated sources that typically include agriculture, urban and construction runoff over large areas. And, a defining feature of NPS pollution is that runoff contains pollutant materials that enter surface waters or ground water at rates greater than naturally occurring levels.

Water quality experts suggest that agricultural activity is a leading contributor to NPS pollution. Types of agricultural sources include cropland, feedlots, irrigation and drainage, livestock grazing, modifications of river/stream channels, construction, and livestock waste management.

The United States Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) is the authority appointed to implement CWA legislation. For the greater majority of Nevada, the Nevada Division of Environmental Protection (NDEP) implements provisions of the CWA focusing on the area that lies outside of its four designated wastewater management areas surrounding the urbanized areas of Carson City, Lake Tahoe Basin, Truckee Meadows and Washoe and Clark Counties.

Of particular interest to farmers and ranchers, are Sections 303 and 319 of the CWA. Section 303 requires states to establish water quality standards based on beneficial uses for a given water segment as well as existing information pertaining to that segment. Waters that do not meet established standards are placed on a list (Section 303 (d) list) of impaired, threatened waters. States must then assure that numeric limits are established for the individual pollutants impairing listed waters and that these limits are not exceeded. The established limits are referred to as Total Maximum Daily Loads (TMDLs). Section 319 of the CWA supports planning and education efforts to control NPS at the watershed level. It requires each state to develop a NPS Management Plan to improve the quality of impaired or threatened waters. In Nevada, NPS water management activities are primarily voluntary at this time, rather than regulatory, and emphasize education to raise public awareness and voluntary participation to improve water quality.

Understanding Beneficial Use

Beneficial use refers to water use that produces gains or benefits. In Nevada, beneficial uses historically include agricultural usage, such as irrigation and livestock watering. In addition to agricultural uses, beneficial uses currently include recreation, support of aquatic life, wildlife propagation, municipal drinking supply and industrial uses.

The amount of pollutants necessary to impair beneficial use depends on the existing or designated use of the waters in question. For example, streams used for human drinking supplies require stricter standards than water used to irrigate crops. Beneficial use must be consistent with federal and state law and are based on the following factors historical use, existing use, anticipated water use, public concerns, and requirements to prevent water quality deterioration.

Water quality standards require that appropriate water uses be specified, achieved and protected. The use and value of the water body must be identified in terms of its use as public water supply, recreational, industrial and agricultural purposes as well as to protect fish and wildlife.

When beneficial usage or water quality standards are established or revised in Nevada, the Nevada Environmental Commission must review and formally accept the proposed revisions. The commission represents several state agencies including Forestry, Mining, Agriculture, Health, Wildlife, and State Water Engineer. Additionally, the Governor appoints four citizen members who further address issues concerning agriculture, economic development, mining, and the environment. Nevada Division Environmental Protection provides public hearings to inform citizens of established or revised standards that are site specific to a water body. Citizens may comment at that time, either in writing or in person. Based on federal and state requirements, available water quality monitoring data, and public comment, the commission may decide to amend, adopt, or take no action concerning changes to established standards.

At this point, if dissatisfied with the commission's proposed decision, citizens may file a petition to review the procedures used by NDEP to establish or revise standards. The review is conducted and a judge of the State Supreme Court decides the outcome.

The public has a vested interest in the quality of our Nation's surface waters. The Clean Water Act requires States and authorized Tribes to hold public hearings on their water quality standards at least once every three years. Public hearings on water quality standards provide an opportunity for the public to become involved in the water quality standards setting process. Citizens may make recommendations on improvements or modifications in the standards during the public hearing process. Public hearings are a powerful vehicle through which citizens may make their concerns known to public officials.

Monitoring Water Quality

Originally, EPA was charged to regulate only point sources of water pollution. However, in 1987, the CWA was reauthorized to include effective NPS pollution control and water quality management programs nationwide. Currently, all states, including Nevada, are directed by EPA to monitor water bodies to assess NPS pollution; develop a statewide control program for NPS pollution; and implement Best Management Practices as means for pollution control.

Due to its diffuse nature, it is difficult to measure NPS pollution. In order to identify water bodies that are not in compliance with water quality standards, NDEP maintains a program that monitors over 100 sampling points in Nevada's 14 hydrographic regions and, every two years, provides a 303(d) list of impaired or threatened waters. In addition to these monitoring stations, intensive field studies of water quality are conducted on Nevada's major water systems including the Carson River, Colorado River Tributaries, Humboldt River,Truckee River, and Walker River.

Conclusions

NPS pollution is the scattered discharge of natural and manmade pollutants into the natural environment. As defined by the CWA, NPS pollution derives from diffuse, unregulated sources that typically include agriculture, urban and construction runoff. Water quality experts suggest that agricultural activity is a leading contributor to NPS pollution. Types of agricultural NPS may include: cropland, feedlots, irrigation and drainage, livestock grazing, changes to river and stream channels, construction, and waste management.

Due to its diffuse nature, it is difficult to take precise measurements of NPS pollution. In accordance with the CWA, Nevada has established water quality standards based on beneficial uses for its water bodies. NDEP maintains a program that monitors over 100 sampling points in Nevada's 14 hydrographic regions and, every two years, provides a 303(d) list of impaired or threatened waters. Each state is required to address listed waters by establishing TMDLs to specify measurable limits for individual pollutants and plan for pollution control of NPS at the watershed level.

Farmers and ranchers must learn about federal policy affecting water resource management, NPS and maintain an awareness of agricultural activities that could potentially impact water quality.

The first step in accomplishing this is to learn about federal and state laws regulating water quality and NPS programs in place to improve water quality controlling specifically for NPS pollutants.

Next, Best management Practices must be identified and implemented to control for potential NPS associated with agricultural activity.

References

* Donaldson, S. & M. Hefner. 2004. Water Quality Challenges Facing Our Community. Available online at: http://www.unce.unr.edu/publications/FSPubs/FS0444.pdf.

* Nevada Division of Environmental Protection. 2002. Nevada's 303(d) List. Nevada Department of Conservation and Natural Resources. Carson City, Nevada. Available online at: http://nevada.dis.state.nv.us/ndep/bwqp/303dlist.htm.

* Singletary, L. & J. Davison. 2003. Farm and Rangeland Water Quality Management: A Field Guide for Nevada's Agricultural Producers. Available online at: http://www.unce.unr.edu/publications/EBPubs/EB0301.pdf.

HJM 1 - NMSU Water Study

HOUSE JOINT MEMORIAL 1
49TH LEGISLATURE - STATE OF NEW MEXICO -
FIRST SESSION, 2009

INTRODUCED BY
Paul C. Bandy

FOR THE WATER AND NATURAL RESOURCES COMMITTEE

A JOINT MEMORIAL REQUESTING NEW MEXICO STATE UNIVERSITY TO REPORT RESULTS OF RESEARCH ON WATER CONSERVATION METHODS THAT REDUCE CONSUMPTIVE USE.

WHEREAS, the legislature has received testimony on the
need for water conservation; and
WHEREAS, agriculture is the single largest consumer of
water; and
WHEREAS, Senate Bill 461 was negotiated and enacted in
2007 to provide incentives for irrigators to conserve more
water; and
WHEREAS, implementation of Senate Bill 461 by the office
of the state engineer has not resulted in water savings as
intended; and
WHEREAS, the need to encourage conservation and respect
private property rights are inherently compatible; and
WHEREAS, existing state policy works contrary to that
goal; and
WHEREAS, New Mexico state university has continuing
research programs to test various water practices and their
impacts on consumptive use efficiencies;
NOW, THEREFORE, BE IT RESOLVED BY THE LEGISLATURE OF THE
STATE OF NEW MEXICO that New Mexico state university be
requested to report to the legislature the results of research
on water conservation methods that reduce consumptive use along
with any recommendations for legislation to the appropriate
interm committee by December 2009; and
BE IT FURTHER RESOLVED that a copy of this memorial be
transmitted to the president of New Mexico state university.

Ranchers Taking A Stand In Agustin Plains Water Grab

By John Larson for Mountain Mail

SOCORRO, New Mexico (STPNS) -- A group of New Mexico ranchers is spearheading an effort to convince the state Legislature to change the regulations governing the jurisdiction of the Office of the State Engineer.

At the Joint Stockman’s Convention last weekend in Albuquerque, two resolutions were passed concerning the attempt by San Agustin Ranch LLC, a New York firm owned by Italian businessman Bruno Modena, to pump the San Agustin aquifer dry in order to sell water back to state entities.

Caren Cowan, executive director of the New Mexico Cattle Growers Association, said the resolutions were voted on by representatives from the cattle growers, wool growers, Cowbelles, dairy farmers and New Mexico Federal Lands Council.

“This is where cattle growers develop their policies for the coming year,” Cowan said. “This is traditionally the largest agricultural gathering in the state. There were about 500 attendees from all over New Mexico and a few legislators.”

She said the cattle growers association alone boasts about 1,500 members.

“We’re concerned about the lack of authority the Office of the State Engineer has over deep wells,” Cowan said. “As it stands now, the drilling of deep water wells of non-potable water greater than 2,500 feet, exclusive of produced water, is presently outside the Office of the State Engineer’s jurisdiction. The San Agustin Ranch application is for 3,000 feet.”

She said the company amended its application to take it out of the State Engineer’s purview.

The company’s original application was to receive permission to “divert and consumptively use 54,000 acre-feet, or 17 billion gallons, of water yearly for domestic, livestock, irrigation, municipal, industrial and commercial uses to include providing water to the state of New Mexico to augment its capacity to meet deliveries to the state of Texas at Elephant Butte dam and offsetting effects of ground water pumping on the Rio Grande in lieu of retirement of agriculture via a pipeline to the Rio Grande.”

The original plan was to drill 37 wells with 20-inch casings about 2,000 feet deep within the exterior boundaries of Catron County, Socorro County and Augustin Plains Ranch.

The amended application requests deeper wells, 3,000 feet, and takes in a wider area that would be affected.

Cowan said the Cattle Growers resolution supports any efforts of the State Engineer to have jurisdiction over deep-water aquifers.

The second resolution passed last weekend is intended to underscore objections by the Cattle Growers and 500 residents of Catron and Socorro counties to the proposal by San Augustin Ranch LLC to drill the wells.

“We intend to convince the legislators that that this drilling effort will pose a harm to the public welfare of Catron County, as well as the public outside of Catron County and within the San Agustin Basin,” Cowan said. “Any proposed plan to extract such large volumes of water per annum will deplete the San Agustin Basin with no means of replenishing the basin once the water is gone.”

San Augustin Ranch is trying to convince officials that the plan would be in the state’s best interest. It promises to “provide water by pipeline to supplement or offset the effects of existing uses and for new uses” for central and northern New Mexico communities, including Albuquerque and Santa Fe, “in order to reduce the current stress on the water supply of the Rio Grande Basin,” according to the amended application.

“The state is allowing the water go to whoever’s got the money,” Cowan said.

Anita Hand of the San Agustin Water Coalition, based in Datil, said the San Augustin Ranch is speculating on the price of water.

“They have never actually come out here looking at the property. They’re water speculators and nothing more. They’re looking for a profit,” she said.

“If they start pumping that water, our wells are going to start drying up,” Hand said. “Most of our wells out here are two-to-three hundred feet deep and they’re wanting to go 3,000 feet deep.”

Hand said the water depletion would not only hurt the agricultural economy of the area, but also the wildlife.

“Our ranchers are providing water for wildlife,” she said. “With no water wildlife will not stay around.”

Hand said the water coalition urges all residents of the area to contact as many state legislators as possible.

“It looks like right now a big company can come in and just take the water without permission,” she said.” We have to make sure people are aware of this.”

© 2008 Mountain Mail Socorro, New Mexico. All Rights Reserved.

Court: No reserved water rights for NM trust land

There are no federally reserved water rights for the millions of acres of state trust land in New Mexico, the state Court of Appeals has ruled.

In an important case involving water law in the West, the court rejected claims made by the State Land Office that a federal legal doctrine reserved water rights for lands granted to New Mexico by the federal government when it became a territory and then a state.

At issue is a legal doctrine that recognizes water rights for tribal lands as well as federal lands that make up national forests, military bases and national parks.

The court's decision Wednesday came in a case involving the adjudication of water rights in the San Juan River Basin of northwestern Mexico. In the river system, there are nearly 300,000 acres of trust land.

The Land Office manages about 13 million of acres of land across New Mexico, generating money for public schools and other institutions from oil and natural gas production on the lands as well as grazing, mining and real estate development.

New Mexico's top water official, the state engineer, as well as the Navajo Nation, Jicarilla Apache Nation and Ute Mountain Ute Tribe had opposed the water rights claim for trust lands.

"The Court of Appeals got it exactly right," D.L. Sanders, chief counsel for the state engineer, said in an interview.

He said no state court has recognized federal reserved water rights for state trust lands in the West although the legal question has come up in other places, including Arizona and Montana.

"By everybody's calculation, this was a huge stretch in the legal theories," Sanders said.

Had water rights been reserved for New Mexico's trust lands, Sanders said, it would have been a "sweeping change in law" and disrupted the current system that allocates rights for using water. Federal reserved water rights typically are more senior than those held by private landowners or municipalities in New Mexico, giving them a greater priority in times of drought when not enough water is available to cover the demands of all users.

Last year, a state district court in San Juan County rejected the claim made by the Land Office.

The Court of Appeals affirmed the decision.

The lands conveyed to New Mexico by acts of Congress from 1850 to 1910 "were never withdrawn from the public domain and reserved for a federal purpose. As such, it necessarily follows that any attendant federal reserved water rights that the commissioner now claims in connection with those lands were also not impliedly reserved," the court said in an opinion written by Judge James Weschler.

A spokeswoman from the Land Office did not immediately return a telephone message seeking comment on the case or whether the ruling would be appealed to the state Supreme Court.

Wrangling more water than cows

When the branding begins, Brandon Humphries is on horseback, his lasso turning slow loops in the air above a herd of nervous calves.
One by one, he snares the animals by their hind legs and drags them to a waiting group of ranch hands, who go to work with vaccine guns and an electric iron.
The air fills with white smoke and the smell of scorched hair.
After about an hour of this, Humphries climbs down from the saddle and right into the path of a calf that has slipped away from the ground crew. He wrestles the 200-pound animal to the ground, then pops back up with a grin on his face and a splash of green manure across the front of his long-sleeved work shirt.
He looks down at the stain and shrugs. "Shirt was going to get dirty eventually anyway," he says.
A scene like this is not unusual in the lonesome valleys of White Pine County. This kind of work has been going on here for more than a century.
What's strange is who Humphries' boss is.
Last year the Southern Nevada Water Authority hired him to run the string of ranches it now owns in Spring Valley, about 40 miles east of Ely. His authority-issued business cards identify him as "ranch manager," a position that rarely, if ever, shows up in the staff directory of a major municipal water supplier.
Humphries' job is to oversee Great Basin Ranch, a collection of seven agricultural operations the authority has snapped up since 2006.
The water agency's holdings in Spring Valley now include more than 23,000 acres, 4,000 sheep, 1,700 cows, a working hay farm, and the rights to more than 13 billion gallons of surface water and groundwater each year.
The authority also has acquired more than 1 million acres of federal grazing rights, including a sheep range that stretches more than halfway to Las Vegas, some 250 miles away.
The purchases were made to support a scheme to tap groundwater across eastern Nevada.
By as early as 2013, the authority hopes to start sending water south through a pipeline that is expected to cost between $2 billion and $3.5 billion. Authority General Manager Pat Mulroy has described Spring Valley as the "anchor basin" for the project. More than half of the water destined to one day fill the pipeline is expected to come from there.
The water project has stirred fierce opposition, and so have the purchases in Spring Valley.
Critics say the authority paid way too much for the ranches and now runs them with a mixture of incompetence and reckless spending.
Rancher and Assemblyman Pete Goicoechea considers it public money down the drain.
"If they had to pay for those ranches with the way they're running their livestock, they'd be broke in three years," says the Republican from Eureka. "It doesn't matter who's running them, though. Christ couldn't come off the cross to run those ranches and break even with what they paid for them."
But water authority officials insist the deals make sense in the proper context: They didn't buy the ranches for the livestock or the land. They weren't looking to break into the cattle industry or set up a rural retreat where city folk could play cowboy for a weekend. They were after one thing.
"We're paying market value for water," Humphries explains. "We're not buying a ranch for a ranch."
And if authority officials have their way, at least some of their new groundwater holdings in Spring Valley will be sent down the pipeline to Las Vegas one day.
Beyond that, the authority hasn't developed a long-term plan for the ranches yet. Though they are projected to operate at or near the break-even point starting this year, it might not make sense to keep them running as they are forever, officials say.
One idea is to open up the land to the state's university system as a sort of living laboratory for agricultural and environmental research. Another idea involves setting aside a portion of the property as a public natural area.
Authority Deputy General Manager Dick Wimmer says some changes undoubtedly will be made, but it's too early to say what those might be.
In the meantime, authority officials have one very compelling reason to keep ranching and farming on their property: Under Nevada law, you either use your water rights or you lose them.

The team

In the first two hours of branding, the water authority's calves stop lowing only once, when a single clap of thunder crashes down from a dark cloud gathering over nearby Wheeler Peak.
The animals wait in stunned silence for a few seconds to see what might happen next. Then they start up again.
The ranch hands greet the thunder with a holler.
Now it's a race against the weather. As any rancher will tell you, it's damned hard to brand a wet calf.
Most of these cows and steers were born in Spring Valley within the last 50 days. Each is roped and dragged backward across the grass to ground crew members who restrain it with a metal device known as a Nord fork.
In addition to the brand burned onto its right hip, each animal gets two vaccine shots. The males get castrated.
When it's over, the calves are turned loose to rejoin their mothers, which seems to calm them instantly.
The whole process takes about a minute and moves in a way that suggests an assembly line or a pit stop at a NASCAR race, with one key difference: Cars don't fight back.
"It's interesting to see how they do their business, how quick it is," says water authority biologist Zane Marshall, who stops by the corral to watch for a few minutes.
After snapping some pictures on his digital camera, he tries his hand once with the branding iron, then heads back out to continue his work.
Marshall is in Spring Valley to check on a contract crew hired by the authority to map the area's vegetation. The crew's work will help fill in the detail on aerial photos of the valley.
The goal is to catalog the existing flora and fauna so any impacts from the groundwater transfer can be tracked more easily once the pumps are turned on.
"It supports long-term monitoring," says Marshall, who manages the authority's Environmental Resources Division.
His team is also tracing the movements of sage grouse in the valley. Five of the birds have been fixed with radio telemetry collars, a process that sounds a lot easier than it ought to be.
Basically, Marshall says, you find them where they roost at night, shine a spotlight in their eyes and crank some loud music.
"Def Leppard or Metallica," he says. "It depends on when you were born."
Then you just scoop up the stunned birds with a net.
Humphries, who went along on one of the grouse roundups, says ranchers and wildlife biologists don't often mix, let alone collaborate as they do at Great Basin Ranch.
"Usually he doesn't like what I'm doing, and I don't like what he's going to do," Humphries says of a biologist like Marshall. "Here we're colleagues on the same team working for the same purpose."

On the ground

Spring Valley is a patchwork quilt of sagebrush, greasewood and meadow grass, stitched here and there with stream-fed ribbons of willow and silver maple trees. It is also a science textbook flipped open to the chapter on basin and range geology.
At about 25 miles wide and 110 miles long, it runs north-south between mountain blocks that rise sharply on either side like Cenozoic parentheses.
To the west is the Schell Creek Range, to the east the Snake Range, crowned by Wheeler Peak, Nevada's second highest summit at 13,063 feet.
The so-called "Loneliest Road in America," U.S. Highway 50, crosses the valley's midsection like a belt, its buckle the junction where U.S. 93 arrives from the south.
The authority bought its first ranch here in 2006. Within a year, Nevada's largest wholesale water supplier owned more private land in the valley than anyone else.
The almost $79 million buying frenzy has led some to predict that the authority could one day own all of the private property in Spring Valley.
The water authority's Mulroy won't rule that out, but she doesn't think it will be necessary.
"The strategic ranches we needed to protect sensitive species in the area we got. And the ranches with the greatest opportunity for reinjecting water into the groundwater table, we got those, too," she says.
As Wimmer explains it, Great Basin Ranch is "not looked at as a profit center" but as a "holistic" way to manage Spring Valley's water and environmental resources. As a result, he says, what goes on there at times might bear little resemblance to a typical livestock operation, where the bottom line is all there is.
Already, the authority is busy upgrading equipment, examining ways to improve water efficiency, and opening the property up to a small army of hydrologists and biologists whose primary mission is to make the pipeline pay off.
The authority's opponents see a more sinister motive at work.
"The only reason they bought those ranches was to provide a buffer. If they own them there's no one there to cry foul" if the water table drops, Assemblyman Goicoechea says. "They can say what they want, but that's why they bought the valley."
The cowboy lawmaker does agree with Las Vegas water officials on one point: They aren't running their ranches in a way he's ever seen.
"There's some things they've done that have some people in the industry grinning," he says.
At a recent livestock auction, for example, Great Basin Ranch agreed to some unusual sale conditions for its calves that could needlessly stress the animals and reduce their value when they are weighed for delivery in the fall, Goicoechea says. "They were the laughingstock of the auction."
Not everyone is upset by the authority's presence in Spring Valley.
Dennis Eldridge ranches on neighboring land that has been in his family since 1917. He thinks the authority is "doing fine" so far.
"They do things a little differently, but they've been fine with us," he says. "They've been a good neighbor."
It should be noted that the Eldridge family is in talks to sell its 6,300-acre spread to the authority. It should also be noted that Dennis Eldridge has a reputation for speaking his mind.
He says some fellow ranchers are jealous of Great Basin Ranch's new equipment and bottomless financial backing. Others just don't like change.
He says people are always anxious at first when a "foreign entity" moves into the valley, especially one affiliated with the government, which he jokingly refers to as "the big thumb."
As far as Eldridge is concerned, though, it's the people on the ground who count.
"Brandon's always been a good neighbor," he says. "He's helped us even before they (the authority) came along."
Along with Humphries, the authority directly employs three ranch hands, two of them college graduates with degrees in plant or animal science.
About 30 contract workers make up the rest of the staff. Some are here from Mexico and Peru on work visas that allow them to stay for months or years at a time.
There's plenty of work to go around, especially on branding day.
Several members of the day's crew were up before the sun, moving wheel lines that keep the alfalfa green and tending to the two dairy cows that keep the ranch supplied with milk.
Ranch hand Latara Pickering has logged 127 hours of work in the last two weeks.
Her brother, Matt Pickering, literally can't remember the last time he had a vacation. Ask him, and he has to think about it for a minute. "I went and picked up my brother at the airport," he finally says.
To brand every new calf on the ranch takes six full days scattered over three weeks. After that, the animals are turned out for five months to graze and pack on about 250 pounds each.
In early November, the animals will be loaded into trailers and trucked to their final stop before the slaughterhouse: a ranch near California where they will be "finished" with more grazing aimed at adding another 500 pounds of beef.
Humphries says the cattle operation near Bakersfield, Calif., agreed to buy the authority's first full batch of calves based on a video of the animals that was shown during an Aug. 1 auction in Winnemucca.
When a smaller group of cows and steers were sold and shipped off the ranch last fall, the line of cattle trucks stretched for a mile, he says.

Back in the saddle

A water utility with ranch property is not as unusual as you might think.
The Metropolitan Water District of Southern California leases some of its land for agricultural use. So do Denver Water, the Los Angeles Department of Water and Power, and several municipal water companies in Arizona.
What makes the arrangement in Spring Valley unusual is the water authority's decision to staff its property rather than lease it.
For Humphries, that meant a new opportunity at an opportune time.
"At that point, I needed a job," he says. "I knew the ranch, and they needed someone to look after their investment."
Humphries moved to Spring Valley eight years ago from Cedar City, Utah, to help his uncle run a hay farm.
When his uncle sold the place to the water authority in April 2007, Humphries suddenly found himself out of work.
Mulroy says Humphries seemed like the natural choice to look after the authority's livestock.
"It's not like we plucked somebody who has never done this before," she says. "We're going to the people who know how to do these things.
"The decisions on running those (ranches) are Brandon's."
Before he landed in Spring Valley, Humphries ran a landscaping company, a Mormon bookstore, and a side business that sold old railroad ties in Cedar City.
But cowboy life is in his blood.
When he was a kid, his family used to spend part of the year on a spread near Gunlock, Utah, where his grandfather kept 120 head of cattle and "we did everything by hand."
Humphries first climbed into the saddle at age 6, and within a year he was spending whole days on the range with his grandfather. He rode with blocks of wood taped to his stirrups so his legs would reach.
Today, the 36-year-old Humphries lives with his wife and five children in a house with a white rail fence and a sweeping view of Wheeler Peak from the front window.
"Basically, I went from operating a 600-acre farm for my uncle to operating a ranch with 1.2 million acres" of rangeland, he says. "It was quite a change."

Show 'em

On this day, Humphries and his branding crew get lucky. The clouds hold off until the last calf is done.
When the sky finally opens up around noon, what comes down is snow, a rarity for early June on the more-than-mile-high valley floor.
The weather is a mixed bag, Humphries says. It's good for the hay crop, but it also means two guys will have to go out on graders the next day to make sure the roads through the ranch are passable.
"In the ranch business in Spring Valley, what you deal with is too much water or not enough water," he says. "Both are occurring right now on the ranch."
Reaction to Humphries and his employer in White Pine County seems a little like that, too. It arrives in a trickle or a flood, some of it good, most of it bad.
Humphries predicts the anger and suspicion will fade over time, as "people come to realize we're here to be part of the community."
Until then, he knows only one surefire way to silence the critics: "Show 'em."
"That's what we do day by day," Humphries says. "We're under the microscope."

A new brand for a new ranch

When the Southern Nevada Water Authority bought the El Tejon ranch in White Pine County last May, the agency also acquired some livestock and an unusual problem.
Suddenly, the wholesale water supplier for the Las Vegas Valley needed its own cattle brand.
The design job fell to senior public information coordinator Lisa Riess and graphic artist Cathy Leece.
"It was absolutely the most unusual thing I have been asked to do," says Riess, an eight-year employee of the water authority.
Since neither of them knew the first thing about branding, they began by hitting the books.
What they discovered was a rich Nevada tradition dating back well over a century, one with its own complex set of rules and conventions.
It was a little like learning a new language, one Riess compares to Morse code or hieroglyphics, with letters and symbols that contain entire phrases if you know how to unlock them.
"This is not the typical brand you're used to in marketing," she says. "This was an entirely new subculture for us."
In other words, the authority could not simply burn a version of its water-droplet logo into the hides of its newly acquired cattle and sheep. Developing the brand had to be a "very careful, very deliberate" process, says Brandon Humphries, the authority's ranch manager in White Pine County.

Riess and Leece

knew going in that their design would have to be unique, so it wouldn't be confused with any other brand on file in Nevada. They didn't realize that would mean paging through the state's brand book, a 600-page tome crammed with about 4,000 different symbols.
"I would liken it to a copyright search," Riess says.
They also had to consider the landscape in which the livestock roam, since tradition dictates that a brand be "symbolic of the land it represents," Riess says.
Humphries had an additional requirement. He needed the brand to be easy to identify from a distance, but not so easy as to "rub it into people's faces" that the Southern Nevada Water Authority now owns livestock in the area. After all, Las Vegas water officials aren't exactly popular in White Pine County, what with their plans to export billions of gallons of groundwater from the area.
Finally, Riess and Leece had to consider the technical constraints of brand design, namely that the symbol they selected must be easily rendered in iron. And in the interest of being humane, they had to avoid the use of multiple symbols and enclosed spaces in their design that might cause painful "hot spots" in the finished brand.
The process took about nine months and involved dozens of drafts, including one that translated to "small fancy g."
Riess says the water authority's administrative team helped pick the final version, and the Nevada Department of Agriculture's Division of Livestock Identification gave its approval last October after a few weeks of review.
The authority's brand looks like an uppercase G with a waterfall tumbling out of it. And for good reason. The symbol literally translates to "falling water G."
The G stands for Great Basin Ranch, the name under which the water authority operates the more than 23,000 acres it has acquired in White Pine County's Spring Valley since 2006.
"A brand to us is a literal brand, but it still represents the company," Humphries explains.
The new brand was seared onto the right hip of about 1,500 calves in late May and June.
Asked how she feels about that, Riess says she has no moral objections to the practice of branding or cattle ranching in general. She used to be a vegetarian, but now she enjoys a good steak once in a while.
That's where she draws the line, though.
Riess says she has no interest in actually burning her "falling water G" onto the side of a live animal.
"I'll leave that to the professionals," she says.

Contact reporter Henry Brean at hbrean@reviewjournal.com or 702-383-0350.

Hydrocarbons found in Wyo. stock well

Trace amounts of hydrocarbons have been found for the first time in a livestock water well bordering a natural gas drilling area in southwest Wyoming.

Officials say the concentrations of hydrocarbons found in the well were minuscule and posed no threat to human or animal health. But they were still concerned.

"We found this detection for hydrocarbons, which shouldn't be there, and we're trying to figure out how it got there and where it's coming from," Chuck Otto, director of the Bureau of Land Management's office in Pinedale, said Tuesday.

The stock well is just south of the town of Boulder, in Sublette County. The well is on the outside edge of the Pinedale Anticline, where gas drilling has been occurring, Otto said.

The BLM is close to issuing a final decision on a plan allowing oil and gas companies to drill some 4,400 more natural gas wells on the 200,000-acre Anticline.

Local residents opposed to the intense drilling have expressed concern about water and air pollution from the activity.

Linda Baker, community organizer for the Upper Green River Coalition, noted Tuesday that the discovery of pollution in the livestock water well follows the discovery of benzene in more than 80 industrial water supply wells in the area last year. Benzene is a hydrocarbon that can be harmful to human health.

"The problem is that if you're not in the town of Pinedale, anyone in the county gets their water from their own domestic water well," Baker said.

Baker said she regards the water pollution in the area as "a very dangerous situation that the BLM has not even begun to address as they consider approving 4,400 more wells."

The state hasn't determined the source of the hydrocarbons found in the livestock water well, but the nearby oil and gas drilling is a likely suspect, according to Mark Thiesse, hydrogeologist with the state Department of Environmental Quality.

However, Thiesse said subsequent tests have found barely measurable traces of the pollutant, making it difficult to identify a source definitively.

"We're certainly keeping an eye on it," Thiesse said. "And we're trying to figure out where these low levels are coming from, and we keep sampling a variety of wells just to try to get a feel for how widespread the problem is and is there really a health risk to humans or to critters or the environment out there. And so far we're not really finding any significant risk."

Some 250 water wells within a half mile of Anticline drilling must be tested routinely for any change in water quality, he said.

Most of the wells are on the drilling site and are used by the industry in their drilling operations. It's not unusual to find traces of hydrocarbons in such industrial wells.

The pollution found in the stock well was discovered in August, Otto said.

Feds in the Fishbowl
Whatever floats your boat

Under the Clean Water Act of 1972, the Environmental Protection Agency and the Army Corps of Engineers are granted jurisdiction over the “navigable waters” of the United States. If a boat can float on it, it’s theirs to regulate. Over the years, the definition of “navigable waters” overflowed its banks, expanding to include virtually anywhere with detectable levels of H2O.

“What began as a reasonable attempt to control water pollution in our nation’s interstate rivers, lakes, and streams,” says Peyton Knight at the National Center for Public Policy Research, “spiraled into unreasonable federal regulation of isolated wetlands, ponds, dry lakebeds, intermittent streams and drainage ditches.” As time went on, landowners were required to obtain permits for everything from draining a field for plowing to building a dock to filling in a low wet spot.

In 2006 the U.S. Supreme Court issued a muddled opinion in Rapanos v. United States that reined in some of the more exotic interpretations of “navigable waters.” Now Rep. James Oberstar (D-Minn.) and Sen. Russ Feingold (D-Wis.) have introduced the Clean Water Restoration Act, which would replace the phrase “navigable waters” with “waters of the United States,” by which they mean “all waters subject to the ebb and flow of the tide, the territorial seas, and all interstate and intrastate waters and their tributaries, including lakes, rivers, streams (including intermittent streams), mudflats, sandflats, wetlands, sloughs, prairie potholes, wet meadows, playa lakes, natural ponds, and all impoundments of the foregoing.”

If the bill passes, it will create new regulatory barriers for fishermen, boaters, hunters, and even some conservationists, who may find that their favorite hobbies no longer pass muster. The act leaves it up to the courts to decide if “waters of the United States” also includes your kitchen sink.

Experts fear nation's waterways need rescuing—from us

ALONG THE SANTA FE RIVER, N.M.—Rosemary Lowe scoops up a shovel of dirt and dumps it into a hole around the base of a slender cottonwood tree.

One down, thousands more to go.

Lowe and dozens of volunteers spent a recent day planting native trees along a half-mile stretch of the Santa Fe River that has been reduced to a dry, sandy wash.

"We've got to do something and this is one little place we can do it," Lowe says, wiping sweat from her brow. "And if we multiply that by thousands of other places around the world, think of what we can do."

Federal agencies, states, tribes and concerned citizens are spending millions of dollars and thousands of hours on waterway restoration projects to reverse decades of poor management and combat the mounting threats of population and climate change.

Nationally, there are more than 37,000 river restoration projects underway, costing more than $1 billion annually, according to a study released this month by Colorado College.

Andrew Fahlund, vice president for conservation for American Rivers, said every region of the country will eventually be affected either by water pollution or overconsumption.

"Look at the southeastern United States right now and you would think you were in the midst of the Colorado River basin," he said. "They're having good old fashion water wars in Georgia and most people associate Georgia with verdant hills and full streams."

The Bureau of Land Management has spent close to $15 million in the last couple of years on its Restore New Mexico program, which includes oilfield restoration as well as work on the rivers and streams that flow through BLM land.

The U.S. Forest Service spent about $500,000 on watershed work in New Mexico and Arizona last year and plans to spend just as much this year, said Penny Luehring, watershed improvement program manager for the agency's southwest region.

Just weeks ago, the agency and its partners finished planting willow trees along the Centerfire Creek in western New Mexico as part of a comprehensive plan that included removing cattle and building culverts for a road that crosses the creek.

Land managers agree that cooperation has been essential in trying to treat entire river systems rather than just a stretch at a time.

"We've been very successful in telling the story to all different kinds of groups—industry groups, conservation groups, other agencies—and they've all been very willing to join with us to try and fix some of these past mistakes," said Linda Rundell, state director for the BLM in New Mexico.

The work has resulted in more wildlife habitat, fewer invasive species, less erosion and the recharging of the aquifer in many areas. And managers say those benefits can't be realized soon enough.

Federal researchers at Sandia National Laboratories in Albuquerque predict that the fresh water supplies of more than half of the nations in the world will be stressed in less than 20 years, and that by 2050 three quarters of the world could face fresh water scarcity.

The U.S. is no exception, said Michael Hightower of the lab's Energy Systems Analysis Department. Groundwater pumping will likely have to be reduced in the next 5 to 10 years to prevent the depletion of many of the nation's aquifers, he said.

"We've been overpumping those aquifers for the last 50 years and it's beginning to catch up with us," Hightower said.

John Horning, the executive director of WildEarth Guardians, the environmental group sponsoring the recent Santa Fe River planting day, said that rivers throughout the Southwest need to be made resilient so they can withstand reduced flows.

"Most rivers in the Southwest have been damaged in one way or another. This one," he said, standing in the middle of the sandy Santa Fe, "has had a dam on it for over 100 years so we don't have the perennial flows that we used to have. As a result, what was once a pretty lush, rich corridor for wildlife and for humans isn't that anymore."

"It's pretty much an open wound and we're trying to heal it," he said.

Oberstar Offer To Narrow Clean Water Bill Fails To Sway Key Critics

Efforts by Rep. James Oberstar (D-MN), the chairman of the House Transportation & Infrastructure (T&I) Committee to narrow his controversial bill defining the scope of the Clean Water Act (CWA) appear to have failed to win over the bill's Republican and conservative Democratic detractors.

At a marathon, 23-witness hearing on H.R. 2421 April 16, Oberstar agreed to narrow and clarify the types of waters and activities covered by the legislation, as recommended by EPA and the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers. In his opening statement, Oberstar said he is open to making “adaptations” to the bill and invited Republicans and the witnesses to “offer constructive proposals.” The bill is “not an inflexible document but a starting point for discussion,” Oberstar said.

But chances for compromise between Oberstar and the bill's critics, including key committee Democrats, seem slim, and it remains unclear whether the T&I chairman still has enough votes to get the bill out of committee. Rep. Nick Rahall (D-WV), chairman of the House Natural Resources Committee and a senior member of the T&I committee, appeared unmoved in his opposition to the bill. At the hearing, Rahall railed against the unintended consequences of adopting the bill, which would expand the law's scope to cover all waters not just “navigable waters.” Rep Rick Larson (D-WA) said in a written statement April 16 that the “consensus” that emerged from the hearing is that the law should remain focused on “navigable waters.”

The committee's ranking Republican, Rep. John Mica (R-FL), said the bill would be “disastrous” for land rights, agriculture and many facets of the economy.

However, Oberstar's willingness to alter the bill appears to have won over a number of other Democrats who previously opposed the bill. Democratic Reps. Peter DeFazio (OR), John Salazar (CO) and Zach Space (OH), all of whom have previously raised concern over the bill, were amenable in the hearing to passing the bill given some clarification. And with alterations, two Republicans appeared willing to consider support for the bill. Rep. Thomas Petri (R-WI) asked advise for improving the legislation, and Rep. Candice Miller (R-MI), while concerned about expanding the scope of the act, iterated her support for maintaining the integrity of the water act overall.

Oberstar's inability to win over the Democratic critics raises questions about the long-term prospects for the bill. John Pawlow, GOP counsel on the committee, said April 14 at a meeting of the National Water Resources Association that he has “serious doubts” Oberstar has the votes to move it out of committee, but that he may still “blindly plow ahead,” or “do some back room arm twisting.”

At the hearing, EPA water chief Ben Grumbles and Army Assistant Secretary for Civil Works John Paul Woodley Jr. both expressed concern that the bill does not clearly define which activities would be exempt from jurisdiction, which could lead to additional litigation. They recommended clarifying the types of waterbodies covered and detailing the legislation's exemptions to match current regulatory exemptions, as to avoid confusion in congressional intent. Grumbles also made clear that he thinks it is a mistake to remove the term “navigable” from the water act -- a key tenant of the bill that Oberstar appeared unwilling to change.

The bill's backers say the legislation is needed to restore the integrity of the water act following recent Supreme Court decisions that muddied regulatory oversight for some marginal wetlands and other waters. But GOP and other critics are arguing that the bill would grant the federal government broad authority to regulate almost any waterbody and will do little to clarify current legal uncertainty about which waters fall under federal authority.

Grumbles, while resisting insistence that the bill would unravel 30 years of CWA precedence, said he thought it would likely expand the agency's jurisdiction, which could result in a spate of litigation. Oberstar repeatedly insisted that he does not want to expand the reach of the CWA to areas it previously did not cover.

Rep. John Boozman (R-AR), ranking member of T&I's water resources and environment subcommittee, asked Grumbles whether the removal of the word “navigable” from the CWA would result in inclusion of groundwater under CWA jurisdiction. Grumbles said, “I don't have a legal conclusion on that . . . [but] if the answer were yes, that would be a significant change in practice.”

Grumbles in his testimony also provided several other areas where the bill could be altered, including adding additional exclusions to the bill's savings clause, as well as clarifying the definition of the word “activities” to demonstrate types of waterbodies and not actions. Examples of exclusions that should be explicitly listed in the bill are “prior converted croplands” and waste treatment, activities that EPA rules currently exempt from regulation, he said. Oberstar said it was not his intent to leave out any currently practiced exclusions.

Diverse Groups Protest Federal 'Water Grab' Bill

Written By: James M. Taylor
Published In: Environment News
Publication Date: February 1, 2008
Publisher: The Heartland Institute

A diverse group of grassroots organizations and business and civic groups has come together to oppose the proposed Federal Clean Water Restoration Act, which many call the Federal Water Grab Bill.

The bill would strip state oversight of minor waterways and for the first time give federal bureaucrats control over millions of acres of drainage ditches, seasonal ponds, and small waterways that have no significant impact on larger bodies of water.

Nationwide Opposition

Opposition to the federal proposal was expressed on December 5 when members of Congress, state legislators, the National Cattlemen's Beef Association, Property Rights Alliance, Partnership for America, and Americans for American Energy joined the National Farm Bureau Federation, American Property Coalition, and Western Business Roundtable on the steps of the Longworth House Office Building in Washington, DC.

Strong opposition also has been expressed outside of Washington in town meetings, state capitols, and newspaper editorials across the country.

"The scope of this legislation is breathtaking," said Larry Wooten, president of the North Carolina Farm Bureau. "It will raise costs for farmers and homeowners while also burdening state and local governments."

Huge Power Shift

"[B]y eliminating one word--navigable--and replacing it with the term 'waters of the United States,' the legislation would give the federal government authority over anything that is wet, as well as any activity on land that could affect water," explained the North Carolina Coalition for Clean Water in a December 18 news release.

"That term has always been used to signal a balance between federal and state authority," noted Don Parrish, senior director of regulatory relations for the American Farm Bureau Federation (AFBF).

"When the word 'navigable' is taken out, [it makes] everything federal water--without regard to volume and flow. That means gutters, ditches, seasonal wet spots, even groundwater. That's a very big deal," Parrish said.

Unprecedented Federal Power

Even supporters of the proposed legislation acknowledge it is a monumental expansion of federal power. In an interview with the December 19 Sioux Falls Argus Leader, Rep. John Dingell (D-MI) argued even seasonal puddles in America's farm belt, known as "prairie potholes," would come under federal jurisdiction.

"Most of the ducks that migrate across our skies in the spring and fall are hatched and raised on prairies," Dingell asserted.

"Remove [the puddles] and you remove the ducks," Dingell claimed.

Farmers in Crosshairs

"Farmers and ranchers are especially concerned about the combination of these [changes] to a law that has already proved its effectiveness," countered John Youngberg, vice president of governmental affairs for the Montana Farm Bureau Federation, in the December 15 Twin Falls, Idaho Ag Weekly.

"With these changes," Youngberg said, "ordinary roadside ditches, stock tanks, and ponds would be subject to extensive regulation and permitting. Even low spots in fields farmed for decades would be subject to extensive reviews."

Parrish expressed similar concern. "We're strongly opposed to H.R. 2421. There are at least a half dozen things we find problematic with this bill," he said.

"For the first time ever, federal agencies would gain authority over all 'activities' affecting these waters," said American Property Coalition President Linda Runbeck. "Under the bill's broad definition of water, few activities would not be regulated by EPA or the Corps of Engineers, whether or not they take place in water."

James M. Taylor (taylor@heartland.org) is a senior fellow of The Heartland Institute and managing editor of Environment & Climate News.