Colorado ยท county water record
Water in Conejos County
What the state and federal record says about water here, before you look at any particular piece of ground. Every finding names the agency it came from.
- 3,090 Live water rights across 1,394 square miles
- 4,145 Wells drilled across 1,394 square miles
- 104,350 ac Irrigated ground across 1,394 square miles
- 112 ft Well depth middle value across 439 of 1,394 square miles
- 357 days Days called out middle value across 433 of 1,394 square miles
Point at any square mile to read what is on it. Hover the maps below to compare them.
Conejos County by the square mile
Every finding on this page is one number for the whole county. These are the same records placed on the ground they came from.
Live water rights. Decreed rights still on the books. This is where the paper water is, which is not the same map as where anybody drilled.
- none on record (bare ground)
- up to 1
- 2
- 3
- 4 to 6
- 7 to 16
- over 16
1,394 surveyed sections, drawn one square mile to a square. The shading is scaled against every county in Colorado, so a colour means the same thing on any of these pages. The outline is the county boundary from the Census Bureau: ground inside the line and outside the shading is ground nobody has drilled, filed on or addressed. Aerial imagery is the USGS National Map.
Stands out
A listing's priority date will overstate seniority here
54% of water rights were decreed more than a decade after the water was first claimed, against 30% across the state. Listings quote the claim date. A call is administered on the decree date, and the median gap here is 26 years.
CDSS water rights, net amounts 1 of 60 counties
54% here 1st of 60 One bar per Colorado county from lowest to highest. Point at one to name it.
Stands out
This is farming country and the water is committed to it
Structures here serve 129,336 mapped irrigated acres, against 32,919 ac across the state. That acreage is what the decreed water is already doing, so a new use competes with it rather than adding to it.
CDSS water rights, net amounts 3 of 45 counties
129,336 ac here 3rd of 45 One bar per Colorado county from lowest to highest. Point at one to name it.
Stands out
A lot of this county is wet ground
82% of sections carry poorly drained soil, against 40% across the state, meaning a water table close to the surface for part of the year. A foundation and septic constraint, and often the most productive ground on a property.
USDA SSURGO soil survey 4 of 59 counties
82% here 4th of 59 One bar per Colorado county from lowest to highest. Point at one to name it.
Worth knowing
Nobody measures what most structures here divert
71% of rights sit on structures where DWR keeps no diversion record. There is no way to check the paper against what actually came through.
CDSS water rights, net amounts 9 of 60 counties
71% here 9th of 60 One bar per Colorado county from lowest to highest. Point at one to name it.
Worth knowing
Water systems here have unresolved health violations
3 of this county's 8 community water systems carry a health-based violation that has not been returned to compliance. Health-based means contamination or a treatment failure, not late paperwork.
EPA Safe Drinking Water Information System 13 of 44 counties
3 here 13th of 44 One bar per Colorado county from lowest to highest. Point at one to name it.
Stands out
The senior water here was claimed before Colorado was a state
The oldest appropriation on record in this county is 1850, which predates statehood in 1876. Seniority is the whole of Colorado water law and it is absolute: a right from the 1850s is in front of everything filed since, every year, in every dry year.
CDSS water rights, net amounts 1 of 60 counties
1850 here 1st of 60 One bar per Colorado county from lowest to highest. Point at one to name it.
Worth knowing
Half the wells drilled here never had a pump put in
64% of constructed wells have no pump installation on record. Somebody paid to drill a hole and walked away from it. A permit says you may drill; this is what happened when people did.
CDSS well permit action history 21 of 60 counties
64% here 21st of 60 One bar per Colorado county from lowest to highest. Point at one to name it.
Context
Ground here is prime farmland, but only if it is irrigated
25% of sections carry soil the USDA classes as 'prime farmland if irrigated'. That qualifier is the whole sentence: the soil is excellent and the classification depends on water reaching it. It is what an appraiser and a conservation easement both test against.
USDA SSURGO soil survey 37 of 52 counties
25% here 37th of 52 One bar per Colorado county from lowest to highest. Point at one to name it.
This is the county. Your question is probably a property.
None of the above is about a particular parcel. Water is not parcel-shaped: the ditch serving the ground runs through other people's land and the senior right that curtails it sits somewhere else, which is why the state files by survey section rather than by property. Check an address and you get the square mile it sits in, with the wells, the rights and what was actually diverted.
Check a property in Conejos County