Alamosa La Jara
Who may take water from the Alamosa La Jara, who is calling for it today, and how it is running, compiled from Colorado Division of Water Resources records. Click anything on the map for its record.
Alamosa La Jara on the ground — the ditches, wells, reservoirs and gages of Water District 21 · clicktap anything for its record
The well-permit cells in view, as a table
Each row is one ~1-mile cell (0.02°) with the permits the file spots inside it, split into water-supply permits and monitoring holes (DWR’s two monitoring categories: drilled to look at the water, not to pump it). These are permits, not wells: a permit is a piece of paper, and the file does not say which were drilled. Spotting is the file’s own, about a mile at best, which is why the cells are no finer.
| Lat | Lon | Water-supply permits | Monitoring holes |
|---|
Browse this district’s ditches, gages, reservoirs, wells and springs as a list.
The Alamosa River is near normal for mid October -- 98% of normal flow, its 3rd-wettest such week in 102 years of record. 2 calls stand against it right now; the most senior right calling dates to 1870. DWR's statements do not settle whether 7 more calls reach it. This year's runoff outlook, issued 2026-06-01, called for 26% of normal.
Schematic
Historical
Evolution of the network
Trends
Source Our computation, no independent reference · computed here from the screened DWR record Source Our computation, no independent reference · no independent reference; see /methods
This year, in context
In the weeks around 2026-10-18 (the newest reading on file), flows at the 18 ranked gages are running at a median 144% of their own long-term norm for this window — 3 below a typical year, 15 at or above. Driest relative to its record: SOUTH CHANNEL NORTON DRAIN DITCH NEAR LA SAUSES, ranking 1st lowest of 38 years.
How this comparison is made
Each gage's mean flow over the 3 days either side of 2026-10-18, compared with the same window in every year of its own record — so a gage is only ever measured against itself, and gages with no record in the window are counted out rather than guessed.
Gage flow trend & changepoints
What counts as a trend here
Computed 2026-10-20 17:39 from 23 gage(s) with cached period-of-record data. The series is each gage's annual mean flow in cfsCubic feet per second, a rate of flow. One cfs running for a day is about 2 acre-feet. (years with ≥300 days of record). Mann-Kendall (trend, with the Hamed–Rao correction for serial correlation — persistence can otherwise fake significance) and Pettitt (changepoint) both require at least 8 years spanning at least 10 years of record. A gage below that reports no signal — which is not the same as “no change.” The %-per-decade figure is the same Sen slope divided by the gage's median annual flow, for comparing across streams of very different size; it is omitted for near-ephemeral channels where the median is too small to divide by honestly.
Of the 23 gages with enough record, 3 are trending down and 0 up, and 3 carry a detected shift. The clearest is South Channel Norton Drain Ditch near La Sauses, its annual mean flow changing -1.39 cfs per decade (-50.7% of its median annual flow) over 36 years (p=0.0029). The other 19 show no clear signal either way.
Drought history, cost, and the four-century context moved to the Drought tab.
| Gage | Trend | Change / decade cfs · % of median annual flow | Significance | Years | Changepoint |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
|
▸
⚠️
South Channel Norton Drain Ditch near La Sauses NORDSCCO |
↓ decreasing | -1.39 cfs -50.7% | p=0.003 | 36 | ~2001 |
|
▸
⚠️
Alamosa River below Terrace Reservoir ALABELCO |
↓ decreasing | -2.61 cfs -2.5% | p=0.020 | 77 | ~1987 |
|
▸
⚠️
Alamosa River above Terrace Reservoir ALATERCO |
↓ decreasing | -3.04 cfs -3.0% | p=0.028 | 96 | — |
|
▸
⚠️
Norton Drain near La Sauses NORDLSCO |
no clear trend | -0.61 cfs -11.3% | p=0.078 | 55 | ~2000 |
⚠️ 5 gages flagged: their records may have quietly shifted against their neighbours, so treat their trends with caution.
How drift is detected
Every gage's annual flows are compared against each neighbour's as a double-mass curve (Searcy & Hardison, USGS WSP 1541-B); a Pettitt step test looks for a break in the ratio. A gage is flagged only when the breaks AGREE across its references, and a break against an already-suspect gage is never counted against a healthy one. A double-mass break means the ratio between two gages changed, not that either gage is faulty: a new diversion, a reservoir, or an import changes that ratio exactly as a rating shift does. Screening aid for expert review, never a measurement verdict.
19 other gage(s) show no significant trend or changepoint (not shown).
How the measurement network itself changed
This basin was not always measured the way it is today — the API-era record is dense and recent, the early record sparse. 18 gage(s) and 102 structure(s) report in 2026, but structure reporting only reached half its modern level around ~1950. Every historical claim below is checked against this: long-term shifts that co-move with the growth of the network carry an explicit measurement-evolution caution, and abandonment screens whose idleness begins before the modern reporting era are flagged †.
| Decade | Gages with data (median yr) | Structures reporting (median yr) |
|---|---|---|
| 1910s | 1 | 0 |
| 1920s | 2 | 0 |
| 1930s | 2 | 0 |
| 1940s | 2 | 0 |
| 1950s | 3 | 61 |
| 1960s | 2 | 64 |
| 1970s | 3 | 65 |
| 1980s | 4 | 73 |
| 1990s | 8 | 88 |
| 2000s | 9 | 82 |
| 2010s | 9 | 95 |
| 2020s | 16 | 98 |
Mass-balance (network closure) trend
Structure divrec-history backfill coverage as of the last check: 23% of 437 schematic-relevant structures. 0 year(s) clear the 30% coverage gate so far -- the trend activates automatically once qualifying years span a full decade. No action needed; the nightly backfill keeps extending the record.
Reach gain/loss shifts (1990–2026)
Mass-balance kinks computed for every summer month back to 1990 (155 reach-snapshots) — which reaches gain or lose water, and how that has shifted across decades. Each shift is cross-checked against the observation record above: as more diversions became metered, "unaccounted" water shrinks mechanically, which can masquerade as a hydrologic shift.
- SOUTH CHANNEL NORTON DRAIN DITCH NEAR LA SAUSES: reach shifted from -8 cfs to -21 cfs summer mean (more losing, p=0.002, 28 yr) [sedimentary uplands: moderate groundwater connectivity -- gain/loss shifts can be real aquifer response; corroborate with nearby well records] [measurement-evolution caution: this shift co-moves with the growth of the gage/metering network (rho=-0.56) -- part of it may be unaccounted water becoming accounted, not hydrologic change]
Groundwater now has its own tab: 76 monitored well(s), water-table trends, stream corridors, and the advisory depletion screen.
Reservoirs now has its own tab: 3 reservoir(s), end-of-year storage back to 1975, click-to-chart histories.
Cross-gage pattern fingerprint
Over the 56-year window with full coverage (1971–2026), the dominant shared pattern across 3 gage(s) explains 70% of year-to-year variance (almost certainly a basin-wide climate/snowpack driver).
All gages in this window move with the shared pattern -- no localized outlier.
Structures most implicated by reconciliation (as of 2026-10-18)
Which structures' data absorbed the most correction when the current mass-balance snapshot was reconciled -- see the Historical tab for the full picture on any date.
- ALAMOSA CR CNL (diversion): -13.2 cfs (100% of that reach's correction)
- TERRACE MAIN CNL (diversion): +1.7 cfs (12% of that reach's correction)
- HILARIO D (diversion): +1.7 cfs (12% of that reach's correction)
- LA HOYA D (diversion): +1.7 cfs (12% of that reach's correction)
- JOSE M VALDEZ D (diversion): +1.7 cfs (12% of that reach's correction)
- VALDEZ D (diversion): +1.7 cfs (12% of that reach's correction)
- DAVIES CHAPMAN D (diversion): +1.7 cfs (12% of that reach's correction)
- SETTLERS IRR D (diversion): +1.7 cfs (12% of that reach's correction)
- EL VIEGO D (diversion): +1.7 cfs (12% of that reach's correction)
- CLIFF LAKE (diversion): +0.2 cfs (2% of that reach's correction)
Data provenance & quality
Where these numbers come from and how far they can be trusted. Grade B (4/6 points) — the components below are the finding; the letter alone is not. Sources: DWR HydroBase snapshot HydroBase_CO_20260928 (imported 2026-10-04) for history, plus the CDSS REST API for current conditions.
| Check | State | What was measured |
|---|---|---|
| gage freshness | current | newest gage reading is 2 day(s) old |
| diversion record | expected-lag | newest diversion record is 354 day(s) old (DWR publishes ~1 year in arrears) |
| structure coverage | sparse | 23% of schematic structures have data |
Independent check: PASS — 100.0000% agreement across 221,012 stored values re-checked against DWR's authoritative record (HydroBase_CO_20260707), over 20 structures. 0 disagreement(s) beyond a 0.01 cfs tolerance. Checked 2026-08-19; a rotating sample covers the whole basin across successive runs, and the structures this report cites are checked every time.
Federal cross-check: PASS — 98.16% day-level agreement with USGS's own published records for the same gages, across 8 co-listed station(s) and 49,495 overlapping days (within max(2%, 0.5 cfs) daily). Pre-1950 records at some gages carry known between-agency day-stamp and transcription differences — scored at each year's best ±1-day alignment; residual disagreement is real historical divergence, flagged for review.
23 gage(s) / 165,263 daily values (1914-05-01–2026-10-18); 144 structure(s) with diversion records; 1041 with decreed rights. Methodology has not yet had independent expert review — treat every figure as an advisory screen, not an administrative or legal conclusion.
Groundwater
Source DWR administrative record · verify at DWR groundwater wells ↗ Source DWR administrative record · verify at DWR well permits ↗
5,009 water-level measurements across 76 monitored well(s) — 27 alluvial, 33 bedrock — plus 0 administered well(s) reporting metered pumping.
What is being counted
Observation wells and pumping wells are different populations and are never conflated: water levels come from monitored observation wells, and metered pumping comes from administered wells reporting through diversion records. Click any well to chart its own record.
Well map
3D aquifer x-ray
Every aquifer unit as its own head surface, animated through time.
How the surfaces are built, and what they are not
Alluvial water table on top, Denver Basin members (Dawson, Denver, Arapahoe, Laramie–Fox Hills) stacked beneath where measured, interpolated from measured water levels. Units are never mixed; a surface exists only inside its own unit's well coverage, with no extrapolation; thin epochs are suppressed and say why. Vertical scale is exaggerated for readability and z is head elevation in feet. These are measured heads, not a calibrated groundwater model.
Water-table trends
Of 15 well(s) with enough record for a trend test: 7 declining, 0 rising.
| Fastest-declining wells | Setting | ft / decade | Span | p |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| ▸ NA03500907CCC CON 1 | unknown | -5.79 | 54 yr | 0.0 |
| ▸ NA03601001DAD RG67 | alluvial | -0.65 | 48 yr | 0.0357 |
| ▸ NA03400905ABA RG85A | alluvial | -0.63 | 44 yr | 0.008 |
| ▸ NA03500813DCD | alluvial | -0.46 | 55 yr | 0.0022 |
| ▸ NA03601026CBB | alluvial | -0.45 | 56 yr | 0.0009 |
| ▸ NA03501016CBB | alluvial | -0.39 | 57 yr | 0.0001 |
| ▸ NA03501006DDD RG74 | alluvial | -0.29 | 45 yr | 0.0014 |
Stream corridors — the surface connection
Where a reach's gain or loss has shifted, the wells within two miles of its anchoring gage and what their water table did over the same era.
How the corridor is assembled
For each reach whose gain/loss has shifted (Trends tab): the wells within 2 miles of its anchoring gage, their pooled water-table history over the same era, and an advisory Glover screen of lagged stream depletion from nearby metered pumping. v1 proximity = distance to the reach's anchoring gage; segment-based reach join is a flagged upgrade.
SOUTH CHANNEL NORTON DRAIN DITCH NEAR LA SAUSES: 0 alluvial well(s) nearby
Wells labeled by administrative world before anything else is said about them: tributary alluvium participates in the priority system; designated-basin and Denver Basin bedrock aquifers are governed differently and are excluded from stream-connection reasoning. Read bedrock declines differently too: deep bedrock aquifers recharge negligibly on human timescales, so a falling bedrock level is storage mining — effectively permanent — not a drought response that a wet year undoes. All screens advisory.
63% are constructed wells; 21% tie to a decreed structure. A permit is permission to drill, not a water right; most here are exempt household wells. More in three things called “well”, or turn on the Well permits chip on the map above to see where they sit.
Permits issued here, by year
1,721 located water-supply permits with an issue date, 1911 to 2026; half of them had been issued by 1998, and the busiest year was 1972 with 284. The district’s 124 monitoring holes are counted apart: they are drilled to look, not to pump. A permit is not a well, and the year is the date the paper was issued, not a drilling date. The 2,302 above counts every permit on file here; 457 of them have no usable location or no issue date and are not in this chart.
water-supply permits issued that year monitoring holes, when shown 1 issued before 1950 is in the table, not the bars
The counts by year, as a table
| Year | Issued | Monitoring holes | Water-supply | Issued through that year |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1911 | 1 | 0 | 1 | 1 |
| 1953 | 4 | 0 | 4 | 5 |
| 1954 | 24 | 0 | 24 | 29 |
| 1955 | 42 | 0 | 42 | 71 |
| 1956 | 23 | 0 | 23 | 94 |
| 1957 | 4 | 0 | 4 | 98 |
| 1958 | 2 | 0 | 2 | 100 |
| 1959 | 15 | 0 | 15 | 115 |
| 1960 | 17 | 0 | 17 | 132 |
| 1961 | 3 | 0 | 3 | 135 |
| 1962 | 2 | 0 | 2 | 137 |
| 1963 | 3 | 0 | 3 | 140 |
| 1964 | 8 | 0 | 8 | 148 |
| 1965 | 1 | 0 | 1 | 149 |
| 1966 | 2 | 0 | 2 | 151 |
| 1967 | 2 | 0 | 2 | 153 |
| 1968 | 1 | 0 | 1 | 154 |
| 1969 | 6 | 0 | 6 | 160 |
| 1970 | 3 | 0 | 3 | 163 |
| 1971 | 8 | 0 | 8 | 171 |
| 1972 | 284 | 0 | 284 | 455 |
| 1973 | 18 | 0 | 18 | 473 |
| 1974 | 8 | 0 | 8 | 481 |
| 1975 | 4 | 0 | 4 | 485 |
| 1976 | 6 | 0 | 6 | 491 |
| 1977 | 9 | 0 | 9 | 500 |
| 1978 | 20 | 0 | 20 | 520 |
| 1979 | 19 | 0 | 19 | 539 |
| 1980 | 12 | 0 | 12 | 551 |
| 1981 | 16 | 1 | 15 | 567 |
| 1982 | 18 | 0 | 18 | 585 |
| 1983 | 16 | 0 | 16 | 601 |
| 1984 | 8 | 0 | 8 | 609 |
| 1985 | 13 | 0 | 13 | 622 |
| 1986 | 2 | 0 | 2 | 624 |
| 1987 | 9 | 1 | 8 | 633 |
| 1988 | 8 | 0 | 8 | 641 |
| 1989 | 20 | 0 | 20 | 661 |
| 1990 | 22 | 0 | 22 | 683 |
| 1991 | 15 | 2 | 13 | 698 |
| 1992 | 30 | 3 | 27 | 728 |
| 1993 | 22 | 4 | 18 | 750 |
| 1994 | 18 | 0 | 18 | 768 |
| 1995 | 14 | 0 | 14 | 782 |
| 1996 | 25 | 2 | 23 | 807 |
| 1997 | 41 | 1 | 40 | 848 |
| 1998 | 43 | 1 | 42 | 891 |
| 1999 | 35 | 2 | 33 | 926 |
| 2000 | 43 | 0 | 43 | 969 |
| 2001 | 38 | 1 | 37 | 1,007 |
| 2002 | 134 | 0 | 134 | 1,141 |
| 2003 | 66 | 3 | 63 | 1,207 |
| 2004 | 28 | 0 | 28 | 1,235 |
| 2005 | 21 | 0 | 21 | 1,256 |
| 2006 | 19 | 2 | 17 | 1,275 |
| 2007 | 18 | 1 | 17 | 1,293 |
| 2008 | 19 | 0 | 19 | 1,312 |
| 2009 | 13 | 1 | 12 | 1,325 |
| 2010 | 26 | 3 | 23 | 1,351 |
| 2011 | 32 | 4 | 28 | 1,383 |
| 2012 | 27 | 2 | 25 | 1,410 |
| 2013 | 47 | 3 | 44 | 1,457 |
| 2014 | 21 | 0 | 21 | 1,478 |
| 2015 | 26 | 10 | 16 | 1,504 |
| 2016 | 40 | 23 | 17 | 1,544 |
| 2017 | 27 | 11 | 16 | 1,571 |
| 2018 | 34 | 2 | 32 | 1,605 |
| 2019 | 24 | 4 | 20 | 1,629 |
| 2020 | 25 | 2 | 23 | 1,654 |
| 2021 | 30 | 4 | 26 | 1,684 |
| 2022 | 34 | 8 | 26 | 1,718 |
| 2023 | 30 | 7 | 23 | 1,748 |
| 2024 | 50 | 16 | 34 | 1,798 |
| 2025 | 18 | 0 | 18 | 1,816 |
| 2026 | 29 | 0 | 29 | 1,845 |
Every district in the file on one scale · the whole file, one year at a time · Plate 4 of the Driller’s Atlas.
What drillers reached, township by township
11 PLSS townships here where at least 5 water-supply permits naming the same aquifer filed a depth (1,488 permits in all). Each column is one township, six miles square, on one scale to 1,000 ft below ground: a faint lane spans the 10th to 90th percentile of where the permits naming that aquifer stopped, the solid band their screens, the tick the median. This is the permit file’s view of the ground — the aquifer is the name the driller wrote, the band is where those holes ended — not a geologic map, and a township is as fine as it gets. Monitoring holes are left out. 7 of these townships straddle a district line and are filed here because most of their permits are.
545
297 · 55% here
223 · 77% here
221
55
46 · 73% here
36
25 · 84% here
21 · 82% here
14 · 94% here
5 · 62% here
unnamed other named faint = where the permits naming it stopped (10th–90th pct) · solid = their screens · tick = median · ft below ground as filed
Every township here, as a table
| Township | Share of its permits in this district | Aquifer named | Permits with a depth | Drilled depth p10 / p50 / p90, ft | Screen top p10 / p50 / p90, ft | Screen bottom p10 / p50 / p90, ft |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| T35N R9E New Mexico PM | 97% | other named | 237 | 79 / 120 / 200 | 59 / 88 / 130 | 80 / 120 / 174 |
| T35N R9E New Mexico PM | 97% | unnamed | 308 | 45 / 126 / 535 | 28 / 100 / 297 | 53 / 160 / 787 |
| T35N R10E New Mexico PM | 55% | other named | 114 | 70 / 120 / 234 | 58 / 98 / 160 | 80 / 120 / 188 |
| T35N R10E New Mexico PM | 55% | unnamed | 183 | 73 / 160 / 700 | 62 / 105 / 462 | 100 / 500 / 894 |
| T36N R10E New Mexico PM | 77% | other named | 90 | 100 / 209 / 502 | 69 / 172 / 279 | 100 / 200 / 500 |
| T36N R10E New Mexico PM | 77% | unnamed | 133 | 136 / 320 / 861 | 29 / 166 / 689 | 147 / 784 / 1,013 |
| T35N R8E New Mexico PM | 97% | other named | 58 | 29 / 60 / 148 | 30 / 48 / 146 | 53 / 76 / 182 |
| T35N R8E New Mexico PM | 97% | unnamed | 163 | 35 / 80 / 320 | 30 / 60 / 196 | 43 / 85 / 313 |
| T37N R5E New Mexico PM | 100% | unnamed | 49 | 78 / 122 / 200 | 60 / 100 / 180 | 80 / 140 / 200 |
| T36N R7E New Mexico PM | 73% | unnamed | 45 | 53 / 200 / 476 | 40 / 160 / 418 | 60 / 202 / 494 |
| T35N R7E New Mexico PM | 100% | other named | 5 | 30 / 60 / 193 | — | — |
| T35N R7E New Mexico PM | 100% | unnamed | 31 | 40 / 75 / 361 | 20 / 80 / 350 | 40 / 178 / 370 |
| T36N R11E New Mexico PM | 84% | other named | 14 | 113 / 196 / 352 | 80 / 173 / 200 | 120 / 198 / 240 |
| T36N R11E New Mexico PM | 84% | unnamed | 11 | 190 / 650 / 1,000 | — | — |
| T36N R6E New Mexico PM | 82% | unnamed | 19 | 34 / 100 / 348 | 28 / 180 / 308 | 64 / 220 / 348 |
| T34N R7E New Mexico PM | 94% | unnamed | 12 | 40 / 60 / 180 | 20 / 40 / 150 | 40 / 60 / 170 |
| T37N R4E New Mexico PM | 62% | unnamed | 5 | 95 / 225 / 300 | — | — |
These columns on the map · Plate 6 of the Driller’s Atlas.
The Driller’s Atlas · Plate 2 A cross-section nobody surveyed
Every permitted well within a few miles of the line, drawn from the ground to its drilled depth as the driller filed it. The bright part of each stroke is the perforated casing — where the well actually takes water — coloured by the aquifer named on the permit. Nobody arranged these; the aquifers arrange themselves.
The ground each well hangs from is a 1-km elevation model sampled at the point the permit was spotted, so the profile is real topography smoothed to about a kilometre — peaks are shaved, valleys filled a little — and the depths are the driller’s, measured down from that ground.
Hover or arrow through the strokes to read a well.
The same corridor as a table
| Miles from A | Wells drawn | Median depth (ft) | With a screen | Most-named aquifer | No depth filed | Ground, ft above sea level (median) |
|---|
Bins run from end A to end B of the line. “Most-named aquifer” is the family most often named on permits in the bin, with its count; permits naming no aquifer are the majority of the file and are not a family.
Reservoirs
Source DWR administrative record · verify at DWR structure records ↗
3 reservoir(s) with 13,039 storage measurement(s), 1975–2026. Basin storage as of 2025-10-31 (the record's own end — reservoir records publish ~annually): 5,996 AF across 3 reservoir(s).
Why storage matters to the flow network
Storage change is real water the mass balance must credit — a losing reach beside a filling reservoir isn't losing water, it's banking it.
Reservoir map — how full is each vessel?
What “full” is measured against
Bubble size is proportional to a reservoir's record-high storage. Fill is its last recorded storage as a share of its surveyed capacity (USACE National Inventory of Dams) where a confident NID match exists — the tooltip names the matched dam — and as a share of its own record high otherwise. A wrong capacity would be worse than an honest record high, so only confident joins upgrade.
A dashed teal ring marks reservoirs reporting live DWR telemetry: their fill reflects yesterday's storage, is drawn as a dotted tail on charts, and is treated as provisional until the next verified HydroBase snapshot supersedes it.
A dashed red ring marks a dam under an active storage restriction from DWR's Dam Safety branch — the State Engineer has limited how much it may legally store, so a low fill can be an order, not a drought. Hazard class and inspection condition come from the same record, joined only where the dam carries this reservoir's WDID or a confident NID match — a wrong dam's restriction would be worse than none shown.
Basin storage, end of each water year
End-of-water-year totals; per-year reservoir counts shown because reporting coverage varies -- a total is only comparable to years with similar counts.
Largest reservoirs on record
Click a row to chart its full storage history, or open its dossier for rights, documents and dam-safety facts.
| Reservoir | Last recorded storage (AF) | As of | Full | Dam (DWR Dam Safety) | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| ▸ TERRACE RESERVOIR (2103583) | 4,322 | 2025-10-31 | — | — | dossier → |
| ▸ LA JARA RESERVOIR (2103582) | 1,623 | 2025-10-31 | — | — | dossier → |
| ▸ SUMMITVILLE DAM IMPOUNDMENT (SDI) (2103591) | 51 | 2025-10-31 | — | — | dossier → |
Snow and runoff
Source Independent agency measurement · fetched 2026-10-21 · verify at NRCS report generator ↗ Source Our computation, scored against a reference · NRCS forecast, graded here against the gage record
Snow-water equivalent, WY2027
A trace of snow at 1 of 2 sites (0.8 in of water at most); the median for the date is zero, so there is no percent to show yet. The snow year begins in October. The new water year began October 1; the chart fills in a day at a time as NRCS publishes each reading.
| SNOTEL site | Elev (ft) | SWE (in) | Median (in) | % of median | Typical peak |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Elwood Pass | 11680 | 0.8 | — | — | — |
| Lily Pond | 11070 | 0.0 | 0.0 | — | April 4 (14.8 in) |
NRCS SNOTEL, daily. Sites are assigned to the district whose boundary contains them — the snow that feeds this district can also sit in a neighboring headwater district.
Two ways a snow year goes wrong (1981–2026)
A bad snow year here comes in two flavors (both called snow droughtA winter that shorts the snowpack. It happens two ways: a dry one, where the snow never comes, and a warm one, where near-normal snow falls but melts off weeks early -- and the river feels them differently.), and the river feels them differently. In 16 of the last 46 winters the snow never came — the pack peaked below 80% of its median. In 2 more, the snow came but left early — a near-normal peak melted out two weeks or more ahead of its usual date, sending the water down before the season needed it.
The snow never came: 1981, 1996, 2000, 2002, 2003, 2007, 2011, 2012, 2013, 2014, 2015, 2016, 2018, 2020, 2025, 2026. The snow left early: 2021, 2022.
Computed by this site from 2 SNOTEL sites’ full daily records (NRCS AWDB, back to 1981). Each year is measured against each site’s own multi-decade median — not the 1991–2020 normal the chart above uses — so the 1980s grade against a fair baseline. Peak and melt-out need 85% of the season’s days on the record; thin years are dropped, not guessed. Derived from snow measurements alone — it cannot tell dry-from-warm causes apart, only what the snowpack did.
Runoff outlook — Alamosa Ck ab Terrace Reservoir
NRCS's final issue (2026-06-01) calls it even odds that at least 10 kAF arrives over 06-01 to 09-30 — 34% of a normal season; almost certainly at least 6, probably not more than 19. Our own record at this gage shows 8 kAF actually delivered. New forecasts begin in January. How to read these numbers →
We test a record-based adjustment of the April benchmark at every graded point. Here it did not beat NRCS over 62 replayed seasons (14% typical miss unadjusted vs 16% adjusted), so none is shown — NRCS’s own forecast, unadjusted, is the best April benchmark available for this river. Why we test →
| 90% chance of at least | 70% chance of at least | 50% chance of at least | 30% chance of at least | 10% chance of at least | Normal | Observed |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 6 | 8 | 10 | 14 | 19 | 30 | 8 |
How good are these forecasts here? (1950–2025)
Grading every April issue against what the river then delivered, measured at this gage’s own record — 74 seasons: the median miss of the 50% forecast is 15%, with a high bias of 1%, and the observed volume landed inside the stated 10–90% band 84% of the time (a calibrated forecast would say 80%).
Computed by this site: NRCS's archived April issues (their period as issued each year) against the observed volume in DWR’s published record; years with under 90% daily coverage are dropped, not summed. A grade of the forecast, never of the forecasters — these are hard rivers. How this point ranks among every graded Colorado forecast point →
What April snow has meant for this river (1981–2026)
Across 46 measured years, the season’s water has closely followed the April snowpack: a year opening April with 80% of median snow has typically gone on to deliver about 81% of a normal season (a snow-to-runoff elasticityHow strongly one number moves with another. A snow-to-runoff elasticity of 1.5 means a 10% shortfall in April snowpack has typically become a 15% shortfall in the season's water. of 0.7). In warm, early-melt years the river delivered a median of 86% of a normal season, against 121% in typical years — the timing of the melt matters, not just its size.
Computed by this site: the district’s April 1 SWE (% of each SNOTEL site’s own-record median) against the observed April–July volume at this gage (% of its median season) — a fixed window every year, unlike the forecast grades above, which use each issue’s own period. The slope is fit so single wild years can’t steer it (Theil–Sen, log space); years missing 10% of their days are dropped.
Runoff outlook — La Jara Ck nr Capulin
NRCS's final issue (2026-06-01) calls it even odds that at least 0 kAF arrives over 06-01 to 07-31 — 26% of a normal season; almost certainly at least 0, probably not more than 1. Our own record at this gage shows 0 kAF actually delivered. New forecasts begin in January. How to read these numbers →
We test a record-based adjustment of the April benchmark at every graded point. Here it did not beat NRCS over 59 replayed seasons (15% typical miss unadjusted vs 21% adjusted), so none is shown — NRCS’s own forecast, unadjusted, is the best April benchmark available for this river. Why we test →
| 90% chance of at least | 70% chance of at least | 50% chance of at least | 30% chance of at least | 10% chance of at least | Normal | Observed |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 0 | 0 | 0 | 1 | 1 | 2 | 0 |
How good are these forecasts here? (1980–2025)
Grading every April issue against what the river then delivered, measured at this gage’s own record — 44 seasons: the median miss of the 50% forecast is 17%, with a high bias of 4%, and the observed volume landed inside the stated 10–90% band 81% of the time (a calibrated forecast would say 80%).
Computed by this site: NRCS's archived April issues (their period as issued each year) against the observed volume in DWR’s published record; years with under 90% daily coverage are dropped, not summed. A grade of the forecast, never of the forecasters — these are hard rivers. How this point ranks among every graded Colorado forecast point →
What April snow has meant for this river (1981–2026)
Across 46 measured years, the season’s water has closely followed the April snowpack: a year opening April with 80% of median snow has typically gone on to deliver about 71% of a normal season (a snow-to-runoff elasticityHow strongly one number moves with another. A snow-to-runoff elasticity of 1.5 means a 10% shortfall in April snowpack has typically become a 15% shortfall in the season's water. of 1.0). In warm, early-melt years the river delivered a median of 97% of a normal season, against 143% in typical years — the timing of the melt matters, not just its size.
Computed by this site: the district’s April 1 SWE (% of each SNOTEL site’s own-record median) against the observed April–July volume at this gage (% of its median season) — a fixed window every year, unlike the forecast grades above, which use each issue’s own period. The slope is fit so single wild years can’t steer it (Theil–Sen, log space); years missing 10% of their days are dropped.
Drought
Source Our computation, no independent reference · computed here from the screened DWR record Source Independent agency measurement · fetched 2026-10-13 · verify at U.S. Drought Monitor ↗
Right now
This is the 100th-driest week 42 in 102 years of record at ALAMOSA RIVER ABOVE TERRACE RESERVOIR, CO. (as of 2026-10-12; this week’s flow sits at the 98th percentileRank against the record: a river at its 5th percentile is lower than it was in 95 of the past 100 years on this same date. for the date). On this week’s US Drought Monitor, Alamosa County is 14% in D3 extreme drought (2026-10-13). The law agrees: the most senior active call leaves 99% of this district’s decreed flow rights junior to the calling right this week.
Every year since 1914, week by week
Each thin row is a year at ALAMOSA RIVER ABOVE TERRACE RESERVOIR, CO.; each cell is one week’s flow ranked against the same calendar week of every other year — warm means dry for the date, blue wet, so seasonality cancels and droughts appear as warm bands. Gaps are missing record, never a dry river. Click a year to reconstruct it on the Historical tab.
This year against its analogs
Over the 35 weeks recorded so far, 2026’s weekly trace most resembles 1972 (mean gap 14.0 percentile points; next closest 1971 (20.5), 2012 (22.6)). The analog’s remainder is drawn as context — its ending is what happened to it, not a forecast for this year.
The Drought Monitor’s view since 2000
Mean share of area in each class across Alamosa, Conejos, Rio Grande counties — the counties this district’s gages sit in, which overlap the district imperfectly. The Drought Monitor weighs soils, vegetation and local reports; it is CONTEXT beside the river’s own record above, not the water-rights picture.
The law’s own drought gauge
When water runs short, administration answers: calls reach further back in time, and more decreed rights go junior to the calling right. This is that response, weekly since 2015 — the share of this district’s decreed flow rights junior to the most senior active call. Watch it spike in the named droughts below, and linger after the river recovers.
Computed from DWR’s call record (673 calls touching this district) against the district’s rights index. Scoping is deliberately coarse — a call’s own district, or districts named in its comments — and this is administration’s RESPONSE, not a per-structure verdict (each dossier’s curtailment card does that, with stream miles). A deepening call can also reflect growing demand, not only shrinking supply.
1632–2002: this river before anyone measured it
Tree rings record wet and dry years centuries before the first gage. This is the published reconstruction of annual flow at Alamosa R. above Terrace Rez — 371 years, with its uncertainty band drawn, not implied. A reconstruction is an estimate, not a measurement: it answers “is this decade unusual in four centuries?”, and nothing in this site’s statistics uses it.
Woodhouse, C.A. and J.J. Lukas (2006), Multi-century tree-ring reconstructions of Colorado streamflow for water resource planning, Climatic Change 78; data via NOAA NCEI World Data Service for Paleoclimatology / TreeFlow. Source data ↗
This basin’s droughts, by its own record
| Drought | Span | Weeks | Trough percentile | Flows recovered | Water table back |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| unnamed dry spell | 2023-12-11 → 2024-09-30 | 42 | 18th (2024-04-01) | 6 weeks | — |
| the 2020-22 drought | 2021-11-08 → 2022-05-30 | 29 | 21st (2022-02-14) | 9 weeks | not yet (10 of 16 wells still below) |
| the 2020-22 drought | 2020-02-17 → 2021-03-08 | 55 | 17th (2020-08-31) | 5 weeks | not yet (10 of 16 wells still below) |
| the 2018 drought | 2018-09-17 → 2019-07-29 | 45 | 16th (2018-11-12) | 0 weeks | 1 yr (12 wells, 2 still below) |
| the 2012-13 drought | 2012-09-17 → 2013-12-02 | 63 | 6th (2013-04-22) | 1 week | 5 yr (12 wells, 4 still below) |
| the 2002 drought | 2002-02-25 → 2004-01-05 | 97 | 2nd (2003-04-07) | 46 weeks | 5 yr (14 wells, 6 still below) |
| unnamed dry spell | 2000-03-27 → 2001-03-19 | 51 | 18th (2000-10-02) | 24 weeks | 8 yr (13 wells, 5 still below) |
| unnamed dry spell | 1996-08-12 → 1997-02-24 | 28 | 17th (1996-11-11) | 4 weeks | 13 yr (17 wells, 8 still below) |
| unnamed dry spell | 1990-01-29 → 1990-10-22 | 38 | 13th (1990-04-30) | 2 weeks | 1 yr (14 wells) |
| the 1981 drought | 1981-01-26 → 1981-11-09 | 41 | 12th (1981-06-22) | 0 weeks | 1 yr (12 wells) |
| the 1981 drought | 1980-01-14 → 1980-08-25 | 32 | 13th (1980-04-07) | 62 weeks | 1 yr (11 wells) |
| unnamed dry spell | 1978-02-13 → 1979-07-30 | 76 | 13th (1979-02-05) | 0 weeks | 4 yr (11 wells) |
| the 1977 drought | 1977-01-03 → 1977-11-28 | 47 | 7th (1977-04-18) | 87 weeks | 6 yr (11 wells) |
| unnamed dry spell | 1974-09-16 → 1975-07-28 | 45 | 21st (1974-11-11) | 0 weeks | 10 yr (7 wells) |
Detected mechanically: the 26-week smoothed percentile below the 30th for at least 20 weeks; recovered on regaining the 50th. The water-table clock compares each monitoring well against its own pre-drought median (the 3 years before onset) and dates the year the median well got back — the aquifer remembers longest, and “still below” is a finding, not a gap. The knobs are stated because the episode list depends on them — a different reasonable choice merges or splits episodes at the edges. Names are attached where an episode overlaps a drought Colorado already talks about.
What drought has cost here
Since 2003, federal crop insurance has paid $71,525 in drought-caused claims across Alamosa, Conejos, Rio Grande counties — 0.0% of all insured crop losses there. The worst year was 2015 ($30,308).
USDA crop-insurance indemnities where the recorded cause of loss is drought, summed over the counties this district's gages sit in. Counties overlap water districts imperfectly, and insured-crop claims are a floor on drought damage, not a total. Source: USDA RMA cause-of-loss files.
When this basin claimed its water
Every bar is a year’s new appropriations (678 rights across 107 years of shared record), colored by that year’s wetness from the barcode above. Here the correlation is +0.01 — essentially no wet-dry pattern; here, law and settlement set the pace, not the weather. Across the state both behaviors exist: ephemeral southwest basins file after wet demonstrations, transbasin-source basins under drought — and the biggest statewide filing waves sat in the 1950s drought and after 2002, not in the wet 1980s–90s.
Appropriation dates are the CLAIMED initiation of a right, not the courthouse filing date; the record is survivor-biased (abandoned claims are absent, so failed dry-era scrambles are undercounted); and the big 1960s and 2000s spikes sit on legal events — the pre-1969-Act adjudication era and 2000s legislation — not on weather. A correlation here is a description, never a cause.
New to how a dry winter becomes a call on the river? Anatomy of a drought walks the chain in four minutes — snow to rivers to reservoirs to calls to the water table.
Legal
Who serves it, who protects it
Two registers the site fetches on their own schedules, read for this district. Neither is a DWR record; each links its own page and its agency.
Public water systems here
Source Register of another agency · fetched 2026-10-06 · verify at EPA SDWIS ↗
3 systems touch this district (3 community systems reporting 1,925 people served, a figure that counts a wholesaler's customers twice); none carries an open health-based violation on EPA's record.
| System | Serves | Source | Here |
|---|---|---|---|
| SANFORD TOWN OF | 850 | Groundwater | 100% of its area |
| LA JARA TOWN OF | 825 | Groundwater | 100% of its area |
| CAPULIN WD | 250 | Groundwater | 100% of its area |
Instream-flow rights held by the state
Source Register of another agency · fetched 2026-10-18 · verify at CWCB instream flow program ↗
11 reaches over 102.5 miles and 3 natural lake levels, held by the Colorado Water Conservation Board so that water stays in the stream. Every reach, with its schedule and case →
- Alamosa River, 16.52 mi: 10 (07/01 - 12/31) cfs (appropriated 2013) · dossier
- La Jara Creek, 16.0 mi: 5 (1/1 - 12/31) cfs (appropriated 1976, 76W3648) · dossier
- Hot Creek, 13.0 mi: 5 (1/1 - 12/31) cfs (appropriated 1977, 77W3808) · dossier
- Alamosa River, 11.15 mi: 2.5 (07/01 - 12/31) cfs (appropriated 1870, 13CW3013) · dossier
- Alamosa River, 9.18 mi: 0.5 (07/01 - 12/31) cfs (appropriated 1870, 13CW3014) · dossier
- Alamosa River, 7.29 mi: 0.5 (07/01 - 12/31) cfs (appropriated 1870, 13CW3014) · dossier
and 8 more on the district's instream-flow page.
What the water is like -- USGS sensors right now, where it has been sampled, the impaired-waters list, and how the tap water here stands with EPA -- is on the Water quality tab.
Designated groundwater basins are on their own page.
Source Adjudicated record · verify at DWR water-right transactions ↗ Source Adjudicated record · verify at DWR net amounts ↗
Decreed rights on this network run from 1860-12-31 to 1995-06-15. Of the 20 structures with a yield estimate, the median one’s senior right was in priority 36% of a median irrigation season and 0% in a dry one. 9 abandonment screens and 44 compliance flags are listed below as leads for review — a screen is not an abandonment and a flag is not a violation.
Rights on file: 1136 across 1041 structure(s); 82 structure(s) carry 0 court-case references. Advisory reading aids on public DWR data — not administrative or legal conclusions.
Is the river getting harder to divert from?
Over 1969–2025, administration on this district has been tightening: 3 of 3 measures (days under callA senior water right demanding its water, which requires everyone junior on that stream to stop diverting until it is satisfied., calls set, seniorityColorado shares water by date: the earlier the right, the stronger its claim when the river runs short. "First in time, first in right." of the controlling call) are moving toward more administration, none the other way.
The three measures, year by year
One row per whole calendar year inside the call record's coverage (57 years); partly-covered years are omitted rather than reported as quiet. Trend is Mann-Kendall with the same significance gate as every other trend on this site. Counted from DWR's published call record, which begins in the early 2000s: earlier years are absent, not quiet. A rise in the number of calls set can also reflect how finely an administrator records one episode, which is why days under call -- insensitive to that -- is the component to read first. Advisory summary of the public record, not an administrative finding.
| Year | Days under call | Calls set | Controlling priority (median) |
|---|---|---|---|
| 2014 | 61 | 8 | 1870-03-01 |
| 2015 | 365 | 373 | 1854-03-31 |
| 2016 | 366 | 344 | 1850-01-01 |
| 2017 | 365 | 307 | 1855-04-30 |
| 2018 | 365 | 427 | 1855-06-01 |
| 2019 | 365 | 547 | 1850-01-01 |
| 2020 | 366 | 523 | 1854-03-31 |
| 2021 | 365 | 533 | 1854-03-31 |
| 2022 | 365 | 291 | 1854-03-31 |
| 2023 | 365 | 136 | 1854-03-31 |
| 2024 | 366 | 105 | 1854-03-31 |
| 2025 | 365 | 117 | 1854-03-31 |
Why diversions stopped — call-based explanations
Sustained diversion stops matched to senior administrative calls.
- LA JARA SEPG DIVR D (2100551) DWR↗ stopped 2025-09-11 (26+ days) — call at RIO GRANDE COMPACT - LOBATOS curtailing 100% of its decreed rate [heuristic-strong]
- NATE GARRETT D (2100566) DWR↗ stopped 2025-06-25 (128+ days) — call at RIO GRANDE COMPACT - LOBATOS curtailing 100% of its decreed rate [heuristic-strong]
- CODDINGTON D (2100512) DWR↗ stopped 2025-06-22 (131+ days) — call at RIO GRANDE COMPACT - LOBATOS curtailing 100% of its decreed rate [heuristic-partial]
- EMPIRE CANAL-LA JARA (2100521) DWR↗ stopped 2025-06-22 (112+ days) — call at RIO GRANDE COMPACT - LOBATOS curtailing 100% of its decreed rate [heuristic-strong]
- EMPIRE CANAL-ALAMOSA (2100522) DWR↗ stopped 2025-06-22 (112+ days) — call at RIO GRANDE COMPACT - LOBATOS curtailing 100% of its decreed rate [heuristic-strong]
- GABINO GALLEGOS D (2100526) DWR↗ stopped 2025-06-22 (111+ days) — call at RIO GRANDE COMPACT - LOBATOS curtailing 61% of its decreed rate [heuristic-partial]
- KEYSTONE D (2100546) DWR↗ stopped 2025-06-20 (133+ days) — call at RIO GRANDE COMPACT - LOBATOS curtailing 100% of its decreed rate [heuristic-strong]
- MILLER D-LA JARA (2100560) DWR↗ stopped 2025-06-19 (115+ days) — call at RIO GRANDE COMPACT - LOBATOS curtailing 100% of its decreed rate [heuristic-strong]
- MILLER D-ALAMOSA (2100561) DWR↗ stopped 2025-06-19 (115+ days) — call at RIO GRANDE COMPACT - LOBATOS curtailing 89% of its decreed rate [heuristic-partial]
- HEAD OVFL D 5 (2100539) DWR↗ stopped 2025-06-18 (117+ days) — call at RIO GRANDE COMPACT - LOBATOS curtailing 58% of its decreed rate [heuristic-partial]
- MURPHY CROWTHER D (2100565) DWR↗ stopped 2025-06-17 (136+ days) — call at RIO GRANDE COMPACT - LOBATOS curtailing 100% of its decreed rate [heuristic-strong]
- MURPHY CROWTHER D (2100565) DWR↗ stopped 2025-05-22 (13+ days) — call at RIO GRANDE COMPACT - LOBATOS curtailing 100% of its decreed rate [heuristic-strong]
Right yield — how often could these rights actually divert?
Share of irrigation-season days each structure's rights were not called out, derived from the 22-year district-scoped call record (senior right = floor, junior right = ceiling constraint). Call-record-derived; DWR's own analysis governs where available.
| Structure | Senior priority | Senior right: median / dry yr | Junior right: median / dry yr |
|---|---|---|---|
| USFS QP27C (2100730) DWR↗ | 1907-03-02 | 5.6% / 0.0% | 5.6% / 0.0% |
| USFS QP27G (2100735) DWR↗ | 1905-06-03 | 5.6% / 0.0% | 5.6% / 0.0% |
| HEAD OVFL D 5 (2100539) DWR↗ | 1874-05-03 | 51.4% / 0.0% | 11.7% / 0.0% |
| TERRACE MAIN CNL (2100601) DWR↗ | 1867-08-01 | 54.7% / 0.0% | 6.1% / 0.0% |
| EMPIRE CANAL-ALAMOSA (2100522) DWR↗ | 1890-04-01 | 11.7% / 0.0% | 11.7% / 0.0% |
| ALAMOSA CR CNL (2100503) DWR↗ | 1867-08-01 | 54.7% / 0.0% | 13.1% / 0.0% |
| MILLER D-ALAMOSA (2100561) DWR↗ | 1873-04-13 | 51.4% / 0.0% | 16.4% / 0.0% |
| VALDEZ D (2100604) DWR↗ | 1870-04-10 | 51.9% / 0.0% | 13.1% / 0.0% |
| LOWLAND D (2100558) DWR↗ | 1881-04-01 | 48.1% / 0.0% | 22.9% / 0.0% |
| UNION D (2100602) DWR↗ | 1876-05-20 | 51.4% / 0.0% | 24.3% / 0.0% |
| MILLER D-LA JARA (2100560) DWR↗ | 1886-11-11 | 5.6% / 0.0% | 5.6% / 0.0% |
| NORTH ALAMOSA D (2100571) DWR↗ | 1877-06-14 | 50.5% / 0.0% | 16.4% / 0.0% |
Abandonment radar (9 screens)
Absolute rights with 10+ years of no recorded diversions. Screens only — storage, alternate points, and plan operations can explain nonuse lawfully. And diversion REPORTING itself only reached its modern level ~1950 — idleness that begins before then may be unreported use, not nonuse (flagged † below).
- SPRING OVFL D (2100597) DWR↗ (1889-05-24, 1.7 cfs decreed): last active 1988 — 37 years idle
- ARROYA SPRG D (2100610) DWR↗ (1902-02-11, 19.5 cfs decreed): last active 1999 — 26 years idle
- SOUTH SIDE ARROYA D (2100596) DWR↗ (1889-05-25, 43.5 cfs decreed): last active 2000 — 25 years idle
- L D ESKRIDGE IRR D (2100548) DWR↗ (1889-05-25, 6.5 cfs decreed): last active 2001 — 24 years idle
- AGUA CALIENTE D (2100501) DWR↗ (1875-05-05, 15.4 cfs decreed): last active 2004 — 21 years idle
- CROWTHER BROS D (2100515) DWR↗ (1942-06-15, 6.3 cfs decreed): last active 2004 — 21 years idle
- LEIGH F PETERSON SEPG WD (2100555) DWR↗ (1947-02-03, 15.0 cfs decreed): last active 2009 — 16 years idle
- J H VALDEZ D (2100717) DWR↗ (1995-06-15, 5.0 cfs decreed): last active 2009 — 16 years idle
- LE MITA D 3 (2100554) DWR↗ (1874-06-15, 6.2 cfs decreed): last active 2015 — 10 years idle
Compliance screens (44 advisory flags)
Screened 79 of 1041 structures with rights (83 have diversion history on file). A flag is a lead for expert review — augmentation plans, exchanges, and free-river conditions can make over-decree diversions lawful and are deliberately not modeled.
- LOWLAND D (2100558) DWR↗: Observed p99 daily rate 230.0 cfs (max 462.0) exceeds total decreed absolute 69.9 cfs across 9525 recorded day(s).
- EMPIRE CANAL-ALAMOSA (2100522) DWR↗: Observed p99 daily rate 201.4 cfs (max 283.0) exceeds total decreed absolute 85.0 cfs across 12065 recorded day(s).
- EMPIRE CANAL-LA JARA (2100521) DWR↗: Observed p99 daily rate 183.4 cfs (max 331.0) exceeds total decreed absolute 30.0 cfs across 16989 recorded day(s).
- HEAD OVFL D 5 (2100539) DWR↗: Observed p99 daily rate 175.6 cfs (max 503.8) exceeds total decreed absolute 155.7 cfs across 15054 recorded day(s).
- LOWLAND OVERFLOW NORTH BRANCH (2100575) DWR↗: Observed p99 daily rate 102.0 cfs (max 148.6) exceeds total decreed absolute 42.0 cfs across 4418 recorded day(s).
- HANSEN LA JARA OVFL D 3 (2100536) DWR↗: Observed p99 daily rate 46.0 cfs (max 71.0) exceeds total decreed absolute 21.3 cfs across 12184 recorded day(s).
- TERRACE RESERVOIR (2103583) DWR↗: Observed p99 daily rate 43.8 cfs (max 473.6) exceeds total decreed absolute 3.5 cfs across 66569 recorded day(s).
- SCANDINAVIAN CNL (2100593) DWR↗: Observed p99 daily rate 43.6 cfs (max 55.6) exceeds total decreed absolute 43.6 cfs across 3102 recorded day(s).
- ALAMOSA SPRG CR D (2100505) DWR↗: Observed p99 daily rate 36.5 cfs (max 37.0) exceeds total decreed absolute 30.3 cfs across 9186 recorded day(s).
- CAPULIN D (2100510) DWR↗: Observed p99 daily rate 32.6 cfs (max 62.6) exceeds total decreed absolute 31.4 cfs across 25214 recorded day(s).
Seniority (top structures by decreed rate)
| Structure | Senior priority date | Rights | Decreed abs (cfs) | Decreed abs (AF) | Conditional? |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| USFS QP27C (2100730) DWR↗ | 1907-03-02 | 1 | 1113.0 | 0 | — |
| USFS QP27G (2100735) DWR↗ | 1905-06-03 | 1 | 742.6 | 0 | — |
| HEAD OVFL D 5 (2100539) DWR↗ | 1874-05-03 | 10 | 155.7 | 0 | — |
| TERRACE MAIN CNL (2100601) DWR↗ | 1867-08-01 | 8 | 138.2 | 0 | — |
| EMPIRE CANAL-ALAMOSA (2100522) DWR↗ | 1890-04-01 | 1 | 85.0 | 0 | — |
| ALAMOSA CR CNL (2100503) DWR↗ | 1867-08-01 | 7 | 78.7 | 0 | — |
| MILLER D-ALAMOSA (2100561) DWR↗ | 1873-04-13 | 4 | 74.9 | 0 | — |
| VALDEZ D (2100604) DWR↗ | 1870-04-10 | 2 | 71.2 | 0 | — |
| LOWLAND D (2100558) DWR↗ | 1881-04-01 | 2 | 69.9 | 0 | — |
| UNION D (2100602) DWR↗ | 1876-05-20 | 3 | 69.5 | 0 | — |
| MILLER D-LA JARA (2100560) DWR↗ | 1886-11-11 | 1 | 66.4 | 0 | — |
| NORTH ALAMOSA D (2100571) DWR↗ | 1877-06-14 | 3 | 63.1 | 0 | — |
| AROYA D (2100506) DWR↗ | 1875-07-01 | 1 | 53.1 | 0 | — |
| NORLAND D (2100570) DWR↗ | 1885-06-12 | 1 | 48.6 | 0 | — |
| SCANDINAVIAN CNL (2100593) DWR↗ | 1887-07-07 | 1 | 43.6 | 0 | — |
Recent inventory & legal-document changes
- 2026-10-20 — call set: CHICAGO D (39764)
- 2026-10-20 — call set: GARCIA D 2 (39765)
- 2026-10-20 — call released: 39759
- 2026-10-20 — call released: 39692
- 2026-10-19 — call set: RAMONA D (39759)
- 2026-10-19 — call set: MEYER D 1 (39757)
- 2026-10-19 — call released: 39754
- 2026-10-19 — call released: 39755
Water-court filings this month (division-wide)
2 applications in the 2026-08 resume for this basin's division — new rights, changes, augmentation plans — from the water clerk's statutory monthly notice (C.R.S. 37-92-302), the earliest public signal of a new claim. Filings are division-wide, not district-filtered: check the county column. Full resume PDF at the Judicial Branch →
Anyone affected may file a statement of opposition until 2026-10-31 (10 days left). C.R.S. 37-92-302(3): due by the last day of the second month following the filing month — computed, not legal advice; confirm with the water clerk.
All 2 filings, with excerpts
| Case | What it asks | County | Excerpt |
|---|---|---|---|
2026CW5
2505063 |
— | TRIBUTARIES IN SAGUACHE | Case No. 2026CW5: Applicant Kiana Creek Holdings II 3450 Big Bear Drive Sedalia, CO. 80135. jerry@kianacreekfarms.com (719) 588-0908. In the Rio Grande River or its Tributaries In Saguache County. APPLICATION FOR CORRECTION FOR AN ESTABLISHED BUT ERRONEOUSLY D… |
2026CW6
|
change of water right | IN ALAMOSA | Case No. 2026CW6: Applicant KJRC Investments, LLC Splashland, LLC c/o Aaron and Tiffanie Polkowske 14099 County Road U La Jara, CO. 81140 no phone number, no email. In Alamosa County. APPLICATION FOR CHANGE OF WATER RIGHT Decreed water right for which change i… |
Active substitute water supply plans in this district
Temporary State Engineer approvals to divert out of priority (37-92-308 / 37-90-137). A structure operating under one behaves differently under a call than its decreed rights alone suggest — the priority tables above don't know about these; this list does. Source: DWR’s active-SWSP register, refreshed nightly.
| Plan | Type | Status | Expires | Structure | Documents |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| SD3 TERRACE RESERVOIR | 37-92-308(5) PLANS LESS THAN 5 YEARS | Approved | 2027-04-30 | — | plan file |
Water quality
The water itself, in this district
Four registers, each on its own schedule: what USGS sensors read right now, where samples have been taken, which stretches the state lists as impaired, and how the tap water of the systems here stands with EPA. None is a DWR record; each links its own page.
Right now
Source Provisional telemetry · fetched 2026-10-21 · verify at USGS current conditions ↗
No USGS continuous water-quality sensor reports from inside this district. Statewide sensors →
Where water has been sampled
Source Register of another agency · fetched 2026-10-08 · verify at Water Quality Portal ↗
The portal lists 839 sampling stations in this district's watershed (Alamosa-Trinchera 13010002), of which 34 reported a sample in the last 5 years on the state and tribal side (USGS activity is in the station count, not in that figure). Most active: Colorado Dept. of Public Health & Environment-WQCD (21), Colorado River Watch (12), USGS Colorado Water Science Center (1). Most-sampled groups: Inorganics, Major, Metals, Physical, Nutrient, Inorganics, Minor, Metals. Every station as a file ↗
Results themselves are not fetched here; USGS samples added after March 2024 may not be in the portal's legacy profiles yet.
Drinking water
Source Register of another agency · fetched 2026-10-07 · verify at EPA SDWIS ↗
3 community systems touch this district. None carries an open health-based violation on EPA's record. EPA sampled 0 of them for PFAS in 2023–25.
| System | Serves | EPA record | PFAS (UCMR 5) | Lead, latest 90th pct |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| SANFORD TOWN OF | 850 | clean, last 12 quarters | not sampled | 0.0 mg/L |
| LA JARA TOWN OF | 825 | 8 of 12 quarters with a violation | not sampled | 0.0 mg/L |
| CAPULIN WD | 250 | 12 of 12 quarters with a violation | not sampled | 0.0 mg/L |
EPA's record carries violations and lead/copper percentiles; nitrate and disinfection by-product results are not in it. UCMR 5 samples are monitoring, not compliance, and the 2024 PFOA/PFOS limits equal its reporting limit, so any detection of those two is at or above them.
Impaired waters
Source Register of another agency · verify at EPA ATTAINS ↗
The state's 303(d) impaired-waters list has not been joined to this basin's own watershed boundary yet, so nothing is shown rather than a guess; the basins with a join carry the full list here. Why the join is geometry, not a name match.
Call cascade
If a call were placed at a given seniority, which structures in this basin would be out of priority, and how much of their decreed rate would be curtailed? Computed from this basin's cached decrees.
What this does and doesn't model. Seniority arithmetic only: every right junior to the call is treated as curtailed. It does not model reach applicability — structures downstream of the calling point are not administered by it — and it applies no futile-call judgment. Read it as “who is junior to this date, and by how much,” not as a prediction of what the Division Engineer would actually order.
Pick a calling right
Real decrees from this basin, ordered by administration number — that is, by actual seniority. The years will look out of order, and that is correct: an administration number encodes the adjudication date as well as the appropriation date, so a right appropriated in 1970 can be administered ahead of one from 1950. A senior call curtails almost everything; a junior one curtails almost nothing.
Or enter an administration number directly
DWR administration numbers encode appropriation and adjudication dates; lower is more senior.
This week's diagnostic
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System status
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Active river calls
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Hydrographs vs. historical envelope
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Anomaly flags
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Snowpack — no snow on the ground at 2 SNOTEL sites — normal for the date; the snow year begins in October. Runoff outlook — Alamosa Ck ab Terrace Reservoir: even odds of at least 10 kAF over 06-01 to 09-30 — 34% of a normal season, per NRCS, issued 2026-06-01 — the season’s final; new forecasts begin in January. Runoff outlook — La Jara Ck nr Capulin: even odds of at least 0 kAF over 06-01 to 07-31 — 26% of a normal season, per NRCS, issued 2026-06-01 — the season’s final; new forecasts begin in January. Full snow & runoff picture — charts, forecast history and how the forecasts have verified →
Sites, exceedance bands and sources
| SNOTEL site | Elev (ft) | SWE (in) | Median (in) | % of median | Typical peak |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Elwood Pass | 11680 | 0.8 | — | — | — |
| Lily Pond | 11070 | 0.0 | 0.0 | — | April 4 (14.8 in) |
Alamosa Ck ab Terrace Reservoir — 06-01 to 09-30 volume, thousand acre-feet (chance the volume is AT LEAST this):
| 90% | 70% | 50% | 30% | 10% | Normal |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 6 | 8 | 10 | 14 | 19 | 30 |
La Jara Ck nr Capulin — 06-01 to 07-31 volume, thousand acre-feet (chance the volume is AT LEAST this):
| 90% | 70% | 50% | 30% | 10% | Normal |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 0 | 0 | 0 | 1 | 1 | 2 |
Snow-water equivalent and medians (1991–2020) from NRCS SNOTEL; seasonal volume forecasts from the NRCS National Water and Climate Center. Sites and forecast points are assigned to the district whose boundary contains them — snowpack that feeds this district can also sit in a neighboring headwater district. Toggle the Snow chip on the map above to see the sites.
Topology cross-check: 3 parent disagreements, 4 sizable streams not on this network (vs DWR's route framework — under review)
This flow network was built mechanically; DWR's Source Water Route Framework disagrees with it in the places below. Each row is a question a human reviewer has not yet answered — not an error verdict. Checked 5 streams, 2 agree. Know this water? Tell us →
| Stream | This site routes it to | DWR routes it to |
|---|---|---|
| Spring Creek | the mainstem | Owl Creek |
| Alamosa River | the mainstem | Rio Grande |
| Spring Creek | the mainstem | Alamosa River |
Sizable streams DWR maps here that this network does not carry:
San Luis Ditch (10 mi) · Jarosa Creek (7 mi) · Jim Creek (7 mi) · Torsido Creek (6 mi)