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UPPER HUERFANO NO 3

Structure dossier · WDID 7900564 · DITCH · HUERFANO RIVER · DWR record

Upper Huerfano No 3 is a ditch on Huerfano River in Colorado. This page is its public record: the water it has a right to, whether it may take it today, and its history, compiled from the Colorado Division of Water Resources.

Source DWR administrative record · verify at DWR structure ↗ Source DWR administrative record · verify at DWR diversion records ↗ Source Our computation, scored against a reference · scored against DWR's call analysis, see /methods

Where this page's figures come from

Generated 2026-10-15 05:46 by Hydrohistorian. Sources: DWR HydroBase snapshot HydroBase_CO_20260928 (history) + CDSS REST (current), USGS NWIS cross-checks. Engine v0.5.0 (dd58e60) — every figure regenerates from this named code version and data image.

Where this structure is measured

GageFlowing nowRecordHow we know
HUERFANO RIVER AT MALACHITE, CO. HUEMALCO — 1923–1925, 945 days co-located, 145 m

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

In a median year over its last 15 recorded years it diverts 138 acre-feet.

Assembled from the figures on this page — every number above is checked against them before it is shown (2 checked). The detail, with its method, is in the cards below.

Download this structure

Everything on this page as data you can work with — and a README that makes it citable: the HydroBase snapshot it was built from, the build commit, what every column means, the method behind each derived figure, and that method's stated limits.

⇩ Full record (.zip) Print / save as PDF

Or one table at a time: rights.csv · annual_use.csv · curtailment_now.csv · court_cases.csv · co_parties.csv · call_climatology.csv

What is in the bundle
  • rights.csv — every decreed right, most senior first, with admin numbers, dates, amounts, uses and case numbers.
  • annual_use.csv — recorded diversion by year, with releases accounted separately.
  • curtailment_now.csv — each right's current priority status and how often it was out across analog years.
  • court_cases.csv — the cases attached to its rights.
  • co_parties.csv — the other structures that were parties to those cases. Not available anywhere else.
  • call_climatology.csv — how often each right has been out of priority by week of season, with confidence intervals and the seasons the record could actually judge.
  • README.txt — provenance, methods, limits, disclaimer, and links back to DWR's own records for verification.

Where it sits

Location as DWR records it (diversion). Faint dots are the neighbouring water; click any to open it.

Which of its rights are out of priority?

The outlook for the weeks ahead is not computable for this structure: no decreed right on file, so there is no priority to test.

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 138 AF. Its most recent year on record, 2025, came in at 138 AF — 100% of that, and 8th lowest of the 15 years with a recorded volume.

YearDiverted (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 recordDays recordedPeak (cfs)
2011 25 3rd lowest of 15 · 18% of median 41 1.8
2012 0 1st lowest of 15 · 0% of median 35 0.0
2013 43 4th lowest of 15 · 31% of median 30 2.0
2014 85 7th lowest of 15 · 62% of median 55 1.6
2015 249 12th lowest of 15 · 180% of median 91 2.3
2016 148 9th lowest of 15 · 107% of median 99 1.9
2017 387 15th lowest of 15 · 280% of median 215 1.4
2018 47 5th lowest of 15 · 34% of median 106 0.7
2019 354 14th lowest of 15 · 256% of median 194 2.0
2020 8 2nd lowest of 15 · 6% of median 45 1.3
2021 268 13th lowest of 15 · 194% of median 120 2.1
2022 78 6th lowest of 15 · 56% of median 60 1.4
2023 156 10th lowest of 15 · 113% of median 73 1.4
2024 170 11th lowest of 15 · 123% of median 91 1.3
2025 138 8th lowest of 15 · 100% of median 65 1.2

How good is our record of it?

Grade C (5/10 points) — the components below are the finding; the letter alone is not.

The rubric, component by component
CheckStateDetail
identity complete name, type, and water source all on file
decreed rights absent no water rights cached for this WDID
diversion record present 3786 measured days; currency unknown (no data-coverage date to compare against)
record continuity sparse 32% of the irrigation seasons in 1969-2025 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.

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