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MAY DITCH
Structure dossier · WDID 7900540 · 1 · HUERFANO RIVER · DWR record
Where this page's figures come from
Generated 2026-08-28 00:57 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 1868-05-01 — 40th most senior of the 930 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: UPPER HUERFANO NO 1 (1868-05-01). Immediately behind: UPPER HUERFANO NO 2 (1868-05-01).
Decreed rights (4)
| 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 |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 6696.0 | 1868-05-01 | 1889-06-12 | 0.045 | 0.0 | C | IRR | 29 |
| 7014.0 | 1869-03-15 | 1889-06-12 | 0.621 | 0.0 | C | IRR | 33 |
| 7457.0 | 1870-06-01 | 1889-06-12 | 2.0 | 0.0 | C | IRR | 40 |
| 9414.0 | 1875-10-10 | 1889-06-12 | 0.1 | 0.0 | C | IRR | 62 |
Legal record & documents
4 decreed actions on record across
2 court cases:
CA1642, 06/12/1889.
Every case, dated
| Case | Actions | Latest adjudication | Types |
|---|---|---|---|
CA1642 | 2 | 1889-06-12 | O |
06/12/1889 | 2 | 1889-06-12 | 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 90 AF. Its most recent year on record, 2025, came in at 126 AF — 140% of that, and 10th 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 | 5 | 3rd lowest of 15 · 6% of median | 41 | 2.4 |
| 2012 | 0 | 1st lowest of 15 · 0% of median | 32 | 0.0 |
| 2013 | 16 | 4th lowest of 15 · 18% of median | 22 | 2.6 |
| 2014 | 88 | 7th lowest of 15 · 98% of median | 65 | 0.8 |
| 2015 | 321 | 14th lowest of 15 · 357% of median | 73 | 4.9 |
| 2016 | 148 | 12th lowest of 15 · 164% of median | 75 | 2.7 |
| 2017 | 256 | 13th lowest of 15 · 284% of median | 100 | 2.6 |
| 2018 | 0 | 1st lowest of 15 · 0% of median | 28 | 0.0 |
| 2019 | 588 | 15th lowest of 15 · 653% of median | 165 | 2.7 |
| 2020 | 118 | 9th lowest of 15 · 131% of median | 83 | 2.0 |
| 2021 | 90 | 8th lowest of 15 · 100% of median | 104 | 0.7 |
| 2022 | 57 | 6th lowest of 15 · 63% of median | 70 | 0.7 |
| 2023 | 138 | 11th lowest of 15 · 153% of median | 87 | 1.2 |
| 2024 | 27 | 5th lowest of 15 · 30% of median | 90 | 0.3 |
| 2025 | 126 | 10th lowest of 15 · 140% of median | 64 | 1.9 |
Trends for this structure
Recorded use shows no clear trend over its last 15 recorded years — which is itself worth knowing.
How good is our record of it?
Grade B (7/10 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 | 4 right(s), seniority decoded |
| diversion record | present | 4813 measured days; currency unknown (no data-coverage date to compare against) |
| record continuity | sparse | 20% of the irrigation seasons in 1912-2025 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.