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HILL DITCH
Structure dossier · WDID 1200641 · 1 · HOWARD CREEK · DWR record
Where this page's figures come from
Generated 2026-08-27 22:49 by Hydrohistorian. Sources: DWR HydroBase snapshot HydroBase_CO_20260707 (history) + CDSS REST (current), USGS NWIS cross-checks. Engine v0.5.0 (2deb1d7) — every figure regenerates from this named code version and data image.
Where it sits
Location as DWR records it. Faint dots are the neighbouring water; click any to open it.
Which of its rights are out of priority?
Not computable for this structure: this structure is not on the modelled flow network, so no reference gage can honestly stand in for it.
Where it sits in line
Priority 1873-08-31 — 162nd most senior of the 1967 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: KITTRIDGE DITCH NO 1 (1873-06-15). Immediately behind: BREWER DITCH (1873-10-31).
Decreed rights (2)
| Admin noDWR's numeric encoding of a water right's seniority. Smaller is more senior; the integer part counts days from 1849-12-31 to the date that ranks the right. | AppropriatedWhen water was first put to beneficial use. It sets seniority unless a prior adjudication date is later. | AdjudicatedWhen the water court confirmed the right. A use decreed in 1975 was not a decreed use in 1955, however old the appropriation is. | AbsoluteA right actually put to use, as opposed to conditional -- a placeholder for a use not yet made. | ConditionalA right reserving a place in line for a use not yet made; it must be diligently pursued or it lapses. | Units | UsesWhat the court said this water may be used for -- irrigation, municipal supply, augmentation and so on. | Case |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 8644.0 | 1873-08-31 | 1894-02-03 | 1.0 | 0.0 | C | IRR | 127 |
| 11778.0 | 1882-03-31 | 1894-02-03 | 1.0 | 0.0 | C | IRR | 263 |
Legal record & documents
3 decreed actions on record across
1 court case:
02/03/1894.
Every case, dated
| Case | Actions | Latest adjudication | Types |
|---|---|---|---|
02/03/1894 | 3 | 1894-02-03 | O |
DWR's own records for this structure: net amounts · transactions & adjudication history · scanned decrees (search a case number there for the imaged document). On this site: the district's full legal picture →
Recorded use (last 15 years on record)
In a median year this structure has a recorded diversion of 296 AF. Its most recent year on record, 2025, came in at 288 AF — 97% of that, and 7th lowest of the 15 years with a recorded volume.
| Year | Diverted (AFA volume: one acre covered a foot deep, about 326,000 gallons -- roughly a suburban household's outdoor use for a year.) | Compared with its own record | Days recorded | Peak (cfs) |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 2011 | 31 | 1st lowest of 15 · 10% of median | 38 | 0.8 |
| 2012 | 57 | 3rd lowest of 15 · 19% of median | 47 | 1.1 |
| 2013 | 191 | 5th lowest of 15 · 64% of median | 147 | 1.0 |
| 2014 | 184 | 4th lowest of 15 · 62% of median | 114 | 1.3 |
| 2015 | 439 | 12th lowest of 15 · 148% of median | 156 | 2.0 |
| 2016 | 350 | 10th lowest of 15 · 118% of median | 188 | 2.0 |
| 2017 | 217 | 6th lowest of 15 · 73% of median | 125 | 1.5 |
| 2018 | 42 | 2nd lowest of 15 · 14% of median | 38 | 0.8 |
| 2019 | 456 | 14th lowest of 15 · 154% of median | 183 | 2.0 |
| 2020 | 322 | 9th lowest of 15 · 109% of median | 179 | 2.0 |
| 2021 | 425 | 11th lowest of 15 · 144% of median | 223 | 1.2 |
| 2022 | 296 | 8th lowest of 15 · 100% of median | 163 | 1.4 |
| 2023 | 467 | 15th lowest of 15 · 158% of median | 243 | 1.1 |
| 2024 | 447 | 13th lowest of 15 · 151% of median | 202 | 1.9 |
| 2025 | 288 | 7th lowest of 15 · 97% of median | 189 | 1.3 |
Trends for this structure
Recorded use is rising over its last 15 recorded years (+23 AF/yr, Mann-Kendall p=0.029).
How good is our record of it?
Grade B (8/10 points) — the components below are the finding; the letter alone is not.
The rubric, component by component
| Check | State | Detail |
|---|---|---|
| identity | complete | name, type, and water source all on file |
| decreed rights | on file | 2 right(s), seniority decoded |
| diversion record | present | 11788 measured days; currency unknown (no data-coverage date to compare against) |
| record continuity | patchy | 48% of the irrigation seasons in 1911-2025 carry measured days |
| published-record stability | stable | no upstream revisions recorded against this structure |
Advisory reading aid on public data — not an administrative or legal conclusion, not a title opinion, and not a substitute for DWR administration or an engineer's analysis. Methodology review status is disclosed at hydrohistorian's basin pages.