Eastern Colorado

[Autocar]

I seen on the news last night where they had a dust type storm and a fellow was walking across a pasture feild with six to eight inches of fine dirt drifted over it. Its to bad we can't take abandoned pipe lines and pump water from this area while we have it running out of our ears to a man made lake out there and then farmers could pay the pipe line companys a fee to get irrigation water.It seems to me it would be a win win situation for everyone.

[beenthere]

  ;)
Seriously?  Any idea what that would cost? And who would end up paying for it?  ;) 

Nice thought tho. 

[240b]

Yesterday in northern az the wind blew 40 mph all day with guests to 60, section of I 40 was closed all day. line of trucks parked on highway was 14 miles according to the paper this am.  I drove out toward the dust cloud on back roads, it was aleast 500 feet high.



 
(bad cell phone pic,sorry)   All this dust comes off the overgrazed areas. There are places which are starting to look like the deserts of north africa.. Its just the result of poor range management. 

[clww]

I've seen the same thing in Nevada.

[terry f]

    People in the west allready know that water is gold, its only going to get worse.

[Al_Smith]

Years ago when we deer hunted near Vale on the return trip we stopped at a KOA near Lyman Col .to shower etc .That gent if I recall correctly said his well was 3000 feet deep .

Quite frankly you can't tell eastern Col from western Kansas .After Denver it starts loolking like Colorado .

[clww]

Very true, Al. The first hunting trip I was on to CO, when we were driving, I was somewhat disappointed when we crossed the state line. I was thinking "Colorado. Mountains everywhere". Not so until about halfway across the state heading west on I-70.

[Autocar]

Like Terry said when you don't have water its like gold, so yes I think it makes sence to pump it out of our flooded rivers and fill man made lakes and then sell it to the consumers out west. Who ever thought they would sell bottled water for a buck,anything is possible it just depends how bad a fellow wants it !

[thecfarm]

Does Poland Spring water make it to OH??  That is big business here in ME.

[Autocar]

To be honest I don't pay much attention to the names on bottled water. It floors me how many people around here that have bottled water delivered to there homes but here again most of them came from town and think there water wells are polluted. My well is 197 feet and its very good water but maybe thats why I have a hard time getting to sleep because I glow green or something.

[Axe Handle Hound]

Piping water across the US is a really complicated issue.  If you remember just a few years back all of the US states and provinces in Canada bordering the Great Lakes signed the Great Lakes Basin Compact which prevents water from the Great Lakes and associated watersheds from being piped outside those same watersheds. Municipalities outside the Great Lakes Basin looking to get permission to withdraw water from the lakes or from a watershed feeding the lakes now have to apply to all of the states and Canada for permission and that's not easy to do.  Taking water from here to try and modify the growing potential of a naturally arid region might work in the short term, but isn't ultimately sustainable.  Look at the situation with the Ogallala aquifer.  It's being depleted at an alarming rate due to irrigation of arid regions.  You're better off cultivating crops and using best management practices that suit the landscape rather than try to change the landscape to suit the crops.  Aside from the ecological issues, there are economic concerns as well.  As beenthere asked earlier, who pays for the pipe?   If Colorado pays for it does that entitle them to water regardless of the situation in the Midwest?  What if there's a drought in the Midwest and there isn't enough water to go around?  Who pays for the treatment of the water to ensure no invasive species from the Midwest like quagga or zebra mussels or asian carp are inadvertently transported to Colorado where they could have a severe negative economic impact?  If those species do end up there will the Midwest state supplying the water be sued as a result?  The solution seems simple, but the question is pretty complex. 

[Autocar]

Axe Handle you have more questions then I have answers  :D I understand what your saying Marathon Pilpe Line Company told me a number of years ago that they have millions of miles of abandoned pipe lines across the U.S. and it would be pretty simple to pump water though them. And I don't want to pump water out of the great lakes or any place else but it seems to me when you have rivers at record flood stage I would rather see it go to places that needs it rather then out into the ocean.

[mesquite buckeye]

Well put. We are talking about surface flood waters here, not normal flows. There was a project engineered in the 1960's to bring water from Alaska and Western Canada down to irrigate lands in the West, Plains and Northwestern Mexico. Went nowhere at the time. There was no food crisis. As we approach 2020 and a huge world population, food costs will neccesarily skyrocket (sound familiar?) This will make more and more projects of this type economic.

Short history lesson. In Arizona, dams were proposed, I believe in the 1880's to irrigate and supply water for cities throughout Arizona. They didn't start to build them until the 1920's and didn't stop until the 1980's. One hundred years, but they all got built eventually. Neccesity will compel us to reevaluate projects like this. If we follow the same pattern, that would get it done in 2064. Not so far away, but few of us will be there to see it.

[Al_Smith]

The question is with all the irrigation in for instance western Kansas and eastern Colorado really paid off in terms of crops produced .From what I hear all it's done is lower the underground aquafer .

Likewise just how much good did all that government set aside programs do except take highly productive farm land out of production in the great lakes  states .Has it really worked ?

Well it depends on who you talk to just like the ethanol business .

I mean seriously you could divert all the water from the Mississippi river and the great lakes to parts of Kansas and Arizona and it never ever will be the productive lands that Ohio ,Indiana,Iowa and Illinois are .

These are weather anyone wants to admit it the bread basket states of the USA if not the entire world .Those basically barren desert states  or a portion of them are what they are .It's not a bad thing but they are  not and never will be good crop land .

[mesquite buckeye]

You are in error, I believe. If you check the soil quality of much of the plains, you will find the soil to be equal or superior to many of the lake states overall. You have to get to Illinois, Iowa etc to get soils as good. Many desert soils are indeed quite fertile. You will find the highest cotton, alfalfa and other yields per acre coming from the desert areas of Arizona and California.

I'm sure you have eaten some of that water from the Ogallala aquifer in the form of Beef. That is where much of it goes, with the biggest feedlot area in the country in the Texas Panhandle.

Just sayin' :P

[terry f]

    Out here its sunshine, sand and water, and you can grow anything. Sunshine and sand are free if you own the land, waters a fight, everyone wants it.

[mesquite buckeye]

The story of most of the West. Great places, not enough water in most of them.

[Al_Smith]

Well perhaps it's good country to raise alfalfa but it will not sustain corn and soybeans because unfortunately they require a lot of water .

Yes of course there's zillon cattle feed lots but the corn needs to be shipped in to feed them .As I said I'm smack dab right where that corn comes from .

Sure it would be a grand scheme if somehow some of those western states had more moisture but unfortunately that's not the way things are .To get that moisture I somehow doubt in the near future if there is a grand plan afloat to divert all water from the river systems .Where else could it come from ?

[mesquite buckeye]

Maybe you should come out west sometime and actually see how things are.

Lots of corn is grown on the high plains, as well as more grain sorghum. This mostly ends up as beef.

They grow corn in Arizona, as well. Also get amazing yields. Corn is not the only cattle feed.

Alfalfa uses two times or more water than a crop of corn.

Shall I go on?

The old project design was to bring glacial meltwater from places like the Yukon and Dawson Rivers up north. Glaciers contain many times more water than is available from places like the midwest. You can look it up if you like.

[mesquite buckeye]

Don't be thinking I don't know anything about the midwestern cornbelt. I grew up there right near you.

[Al_Smith]

I've been through a number of the western states but evidently not in any area along I 70 having much moisture .Sure I saw milo and sugar beets in some sections but not much corn .

Then again I suppose I could be missing something .Like for example people thinking the entire state of Ohio is flat land like the north western and north  central areas of the state .Yet to the far east and south there are slopes that could only raise trees and mountain goats or cattle with short legs on the uphill side so they didn't roll down the hill .

Do go on though .I would think even if they could get glacial melt which would nomally go else where I'd think it would require a huge ,I mean huge amount of pipelines or a canal equal to the Mississippi river . How exactly would they propose to do that ?You certainly can't do it with a garden hose .

[Al_Smith]

Now on the subject of surface run off .I forget exactly which river it was ,maybe the Rio Grande or some other that all the water got sucked out of it and the Mexicans are raising a big stink about .

Where exactly does the Yukon and Dawson rivers normally go ?If they dump into Canada although the Canadians are nice bunch I can't hardly see them giving up all that water just because they are nice people . You'd stand a better chance of getting free crude oil from OPEC . ;)

[mesquite buckeye]

Any such project would be an international cooperative effort. I didn't come up with the idea. It was done by the US Army Corps. of Engineers. It is actually quite interesting, and supposedly there would be a slight energy gain from hydro power generated along the route.

By the way, the high plains in Canada are also a bit dry....

Just saying...

With money, all things are possible.

[Autocar]

Ive been all over the western U.S. and Canada and they grow some nice corn even in Alberta where its dry the Huderite Communitys were growing corn and then it would freeze and stand in the feild like green foder and in late winter they would turn there cows into it. I always thought we had big farms here till I went though North and South Dakota and into the plains of Canada. I once drove the top of the world highway from Tok Alaska to Dawson Yukon and when I sat on the banks of the Yukon River waiting fot the ferry it looked like a half mile wide and the current was moving it floored me thinking how much fresh water was headed for the Beaufort Sea. I guess I just can't figure I still think a 36 inch pipe pumping water west word could help out the area. One day there pumping gas and the next crude oil so I would think they could pump water the same way in older abandoned lines  :.

[Kansas]

With rare exception, corn flows west to east. Only exception I know is some corn that used to ship to California to the big dairies out there. But so many of them moved to western Kansas. Corn, like any commodity, costs to ship. The corn is cheapest out across Nebraska and western Kansas. Its cheaper to ship cattle to there than haul the corn east. At a 5 or 6 lb of corn per pound of beef, just cheaper to move the cattle.  Hence the feedlots out there. There are other considerations; weather, plus location of the packing houses. Also a tolerance of them out there.

This all may change as the aquifier out there gives up. Without water, the ground is more suited to other crops and uses. But the varieties of corn just get better. Wheat can be substituted for some of the corn, same as grain sorghum. And some of the other side crops can be used for the lesser part of rations, such as sunflower meal for protien.