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Water use practices represent the most complex challenge, involving a moving target, the demands of three irrigation districts and two cities and a matrix of very fixed targets, the institutions which have evolved to guide the management of the Rio Grande's scarce water.

Political Landscape

The cooperation of ten powerful institutional stakeholders will be required if a plan to protect and manage streamflows at Ft. Quitman is to succeed:

Elephant Butte Irrigation District (EBID)
El Paso County Water Improvement District #1 (EPCWID)
Hudspeth County Conservation & Reclamation District # 1 (HCCRD)
El Paso Water Utilities/Public Service Board (EPPSB)
City of Las Cruces (Las Cruces)
Texas Natural Resource Conservation Commission, Water Development Boar
(TNRCC, TWDB)
New Mexico Interstate Stream Commission and NM State Engineer (ISC, OSE)
Rio Grande Compact Commission (Compact Commission)
International Boundary & Water Commission (IBWC)
U.S. Bureau of Reclamation (USBR).

None of these entities have any compelling incentive to proactively protect streamflow, as the history of the segment will witness. Yet none are likely to remain completely uncooperative, if the interests they represent can be protected, and balanced with the minimum water needs of the river.
Throughout the basin, the forces of change are busy altering the way the region does its water business. Our conclusions are that there may be some "wiggle room" in the system for watering the Rio Grande and that manifesting this will a long term political challenge. Getting to an end game that benefits the Rio Grande will undoubtedly require devising and implementing a social strategy as challenging the physical one.

Recent Hydrologic History of the Rio Grande

In the effort to asses the suitability of the Ft. Quitman segment for restoration it may be useful to speculate as to how past, human-induced changes in hydrologic conditions have impacted the present biologic conditions in the Forgotten River segment. For this purpose, the hydrologic record is divided into five fairly distinct periods:

Beginning of record (1889) to 1895- The Rio Grande produced reliable, moderate spring floods in May and was dry very infrequently. This period was generally a wet one; it followed full development in San Luis Valley (CO) and preceded full development in the middle and lower Rio Grande.

1896 to 1914-The annual flood peak shifted toward June and July. Both peak volume and timing were erratic, with monsoonal peaks often exceeding spring runoff volumes. Irrigation development in NM and TX accelerated during this period. Total runoff averaged >550 kaf (with a low of 31 kaf). There were two periods of zero or near zero flows (two and four months duration, respectively). The historic flood occurred in 1914. Elephant Butte began storage in 1915. During this period, uneven aged stands of cottonwood dominated the riparian areas and tamarisk was not yet evident.

1915 to 1933-The spring runoff peak was eliminated. Annual peaks shifted toward August monsoons. Discharge was more uniformly distributed throughout the year, as the effects of river regulation by Elephant Butte became manifest. Irrigation depletions increased. Tamarisk was deliberately Introduced in the middle Rio Grande (Rio Puerco) as a soil conservation experiment (1926). Average channel widths decreased from 100 meters to 30 meters. In early 30's, pioneer tamarisk enter the record, perhaps as colonizers of new riverside areas. TDS and salinity readings during this period averaged slightly less than present readings (typically 1100 TDS and 200 Na @ El Paso). The last cohort of native cottonwoods were propagated by the 1914 event; thereafter the species began to decline.

1934 to 1975- Sediment scoured from the river bed below Caballo Reservoir (1936 on) was added to arroyo discharges during monsoon events, steadily raising the elevation of the river bed. Also during this period, there were no May-June peak flows to recruit cottonwood cohorts. At both El Paso and Presidio, flood frequencies leaped dramatically as annual maximum stage increased and maximum discharge decreased (Everett, 1998).