BOYD FREEMAN DITCH ☆ My Water

The record and the river

Where this structure is measured

A green link is DWR's own: either its telemetry inventory maps this WDID to that station, or the station is named for this WDID (0700553 → 0700553A). An amber one is ours — the station sits within 250 m and shares a distinctive word with this structure's name, which is a strong hint rather than a DWR statement that this gage meters this structure. Wrong? Tell us.

In short

BOYD FREEMAN DITCH holds 8 decreed rights on CACHE LA POUDRE RIVER. A call at OGILVY DITCH on CACHE LA POUDRE RIVER (1884-04-10) currently reaches it: junior rights called out. 1 further call state no district and sit outside this one, so it is counted here rather than assumed either way. That is today's position; the weeks ahead cannot be projected for it: no administrative call record for this basin. In a median year over its last 15 recorded years it diverts 266 acre-feet. It was a party to 5 court cases that also touched 12 other structures.

Assembled from the figures on this page — every number above is checked against them before it is shown (7 checked). The detail, with its method, is in the cards below.

Current administration

● Junior rights called out — call at OGILVY DITCH (CACHE LA POUDRE RIVER, priority 1884-04-10).

Which of its rights are out of priority?

The outlook for the weeks ahead is not computable for this structure: no administrative call record for this basin. Today’s position is a separate question, and it is answered in Current administration above — that screen reads the district’s active calls and needs no reference gage.

Where it sits in line

Priority 1862-03-15 — 64th most senior of the 2964 structures with decreed rights in this water districtDWR's administrative subdivision of a river basin; the unit calls are usually stated in..

Under prior appropriationColorado's rule for sharing water: first in time, first in right. Age decides, not proximity or need., everything ahead of it in this line is satisfied in full before it receives any water. Immediately ahead: GLADE RES (1862-03-01)☆. Immediately behind: WHITNEY IRR DITCH (1862-09-01)☆.

On MAINSTEM at river mile 150.7, it is 721st of 818 down the reach. Immediately upstream: CANAL 3 F STREET RETURN☆. Immediately downstream: BOYD FREEMAN DITCH RETURN☆.

Position on the modelled network, not a claim about whose water this is — a stream carries water from many rights at once, and diverted water returns to it.

Decreed rights (8)

Amounts marked cfs are flow rates; AF are stored volumes (storage rights are decreed in acre-feet). An absolute amount of 0.0 beside an alt-point amount is not a dead right: the water is decreed at another structure, and that row records permission to divert it here instead (an alternate point or exchange). A case listing several numbers reflects the original decree plus later change cases.

How much of this decree was in priority, by day

A right is in priority on a day when it is senior to every call administering this structure. Of its 54.05 cfs decreed rate, the average day over the last 6 year(s) had 54.05 cfs in priority (100% of the decree). No call in effect is a free river — that was 100.0% of days.

Calls are set and released at a time of day, not at midnight, so a day is counted by the hour: a call setting at 4pm costs that day a third of its rate, not all of it.

This is paper water. It is the decreed rate that was in priority — not water that was physically in the stream, and not water this structure diverted. A ditch can be in priority for 50 cfs on a day the creek carries five. What that distinction means →

Legal record & documents

25 decreed actions on record across 9 court cases: 99CW0234, 22CW3220, 15CW3099, 98CW0476, CA5327, CA5326, CA5096, CA0320, 99CW0232.

152 imaged documents on DWR’s shelf for this structure — 148 water-court documents across 10 cases, including 9 decrees. Every row opens the scanned PDF at DWR. Listing as of 2026-09-26.

Imaged documents at DWR. DWR keeps the scanned documents for this structure — decrees, rulings, plats, correspondence — in its Laserfiche archive. Open the list directly: imaged documents for 0300935 ↗ (indexed by structure, not by case — the cases listed above appear within the list).

Other DWR records for this structure: DWR’s page for this structure ↗ — net amounts, water rights, transactions & adjudication history, and diversion records, all on that one page. On this site: the district’s full legal picture →

Structures it shares court cases with

This structure was a party to 5 court cases that also touched 12 other structures — changes of water right, augmentation plans, exchanges. Being parties to the same case does not by itself mean water moved between them; which way it ran, and how much, is in the decree.

Also a party to 3 omnibus adjudications (CA0320, 65 structures; 99CW0234, 21 structures; 99CW0232, 15 structures). Those settled many rights at once and are listed separately: they say these structures were adjudicated together, not that they deal with each other.

Recorded use (last 15 years on record)

Years far under the decreed amount? That gap has a name — paper water vs. wet water, explained on this structure.

In a median year this structure has a recorded diversion of 266 AF. Its most recent year on record, 2025, came in at 0 AF — 0% of that, and 1st lowest of the 15 years with a recorded volume.

Trends for this structure

Recorded use shows no clear trend over its last 15 recorded years — which is itself worth knowing.

Its reference gage, Canal # 3 near Greeley: annual flow declining at -3.29 cfs per decade (-11.4% of its median annual flow).

Every gage and reach in this district →

How good is our record of it?

Grade A (9/10 points) — the components below are the finding; the letter alone is not.