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Thursday, July 31, 2008
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North American Monsoon
This month's article is up at Colorado Central Magazine. Here's the link to the August table of contents. Here are the Coyote Gulch links we used for the article.
Speaking of central Colorado. We're just back from the West Elk Wilderness. We think we got hit with a bit of Hurricane Dolly being driven north by the North American Monsoon. We were able to witness the monsoon looking from the bottom up for over two hours of downpour on Sunday night. A little bit of hail also. Thankfully it was pretty warm. We got the fire going quickly afterward.
Speaking of the North American Monsoon say hello to the VISIT: Meteorological Interpretation Blog from up at Colorado State University. Check out this post about the monsoons and flooding.
Here's how they describe their world:
This blog has been developed by the Virtual Institute for Satellite Integration Training (VISIT) and Satellite Hydrology and Meteorology (SHyMet) programs at the Cooperative Institute for Research in the Atmosphere (CIRA) and under the direction of Regional and Mesoscale Meteorology Branch (RAMMB) of NOAA/NESDIS. It is intended to open the doors of communication between the Operational, Academic and Training Meteorology communities.
This particular blog forum is intended to be presented (mostly) in question and answer format. The "answers" to those posts which have definitive answers will be given about two weeks after the post first appears, however, discussion/comments are encouraged both before and after. For those questions (posts) without definitive answers, we hope to, through thorough discussion, get to the core of the problem.
Here's the RSS feed. Subscibed!
More Coyote Gulch coverage here.
"colorado water"
5:13:51 PM 
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Keep the Rio Grande grand
Don't forget to head on over to South Fork on August 16th for the Keep the Rio Grande Grand benefit for the Rio Grande Headwaters Trust. From the website:
Saturday, August 16, 2008, 6 PM to 9 PM, South Fork Community Center, South Fork, Colorado
You are invited...to a premier art occasion, the first annual "Keep the Rio Grande Grand!" a Premier Art Event to benefit the Rio Grande Headwaters Land Trust. This art sale will feature exceptionally fine artists from the San Luis Valley and the Southwest, with their works for purchase and one-third of the proceeds supporting conservation of the Rio Grande in Colorado.
"Keep the Rio Grande Grand!" will be a lively gathering of artists and art lovers, this elegant evening will feature fine art in diverse media, along with delicious hors d'oeurves, wine and enchanting company.
With the energy and support of the participating artists and our dedicated Steering Committee and Host Committee, we aim to make this an annual celebration of the arts and a real benefit to support our organization's work to protect the beauty, wildlife, and agricultural productivity of the land and water along the Rio Grande and across the San Luis Valley...to "Keep the Rio Grande Grand!"
Thanks to SLV Dweller for the link.
"colorado water"
8:33:16 AM
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Riparian habitat: Stormwater management
Coyote Gulch feels compelled to remind readers of the importance of improving the water quality of storm runoff from urban areas from time to time. Here are a couple of excerpts from an Environmental News Network article detailing some of the reasoning behind stormwater management:
We all know water is essential to life. But consider how much the lifestyle to which we've become accustomed depends upon having plenty of cheap, clean water available. Rivers, streams and wetlands are the collectors, filters, conveyors, and storage compartments for our nation's fresh water supply.
Freshwater on the land surface sustains life as we know it. [ed. emphasis ours] Damage to healthy stream banks and riparian vegetation can diminish key components of the water cycle, including interception of water by plants, infiltration of water into the soil and groundwater, and evapotranspiration of water taken up from the soil and transpired from plants. Denuded riparian areas are not able to efficiently perform their intended functions of slowing, filtering and absorbing runoff. Healthy riparian areas are some of the most important ecosystems on Earth, and renewal and repair of these systems has cascading benefits...
- Contaminated stormwater runoff - Some 70 percent of urban water quality problems are the result of contaminated stormwater runoff. Agricultural runoff can similarly degrade rural streams and wetlands, and agricultural runoff has been linked to areas of low productivity in our oceans such as the Gulf Dead Zone.
- Inefficient water use - Globally, clean potable water is running out. Water use is up an estimated 209 percent in the U.S. since 1950 and 36 states anticipate local, regional or state-wide water shortages in the next five years. Much of our water use is hidden. The USGS reports that a typical American meal of hamburger, fries and a soft drink, uses about 1,500 gallons of water - enough to fill a small swimming pool.
-Land-use impacts and associated effects - Multiple impacts of development and inappropriate land use are affecting the health, productivity and use values of freshwater resources. Within a single watershed we often see impacts from roads, irrigation withdrawals and return flow, agricultural chemicals, forest management activities, recreational use and residential, commercial, and industrial development...
Every sustainable restoration project matters The magnitude of the problems facing our freshwater resources can seem overwhelming. But each sustainable project that renews and restores healthy floodplain function, even to a portion of a stream, does make a difference. Only one inch of rain falling on one acre represents 27,154 gallons of water. One inch of rain falling on one square mile (640 acres) represents 17.38 million gallons of water to be filtered, conveyed and stored.
More Coyote Gulch coverage here.
"colorado water"
8:20:32 AM
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Cutthroat restoration on Hermosa Creek
Here's a look at a recent tour of Hermosa Creek and the ongoing success restoring cutthroat trout, from The Durango Herald. From the article:
On July 17, Trout Unlimited (TU) sponsored a media tour of the western branch of the creek, which is scheduled to join the East Fork in the cutthroat-only club in the spring of 2009. The tour gave TU a chance to tout its support of the creation of a wilderness area in the Hermosa Creek drainage, and show how the cutthroat restoration project could compliment any new wilderness proposal. "Basically, this project is taking the upper reaches of this river and turning it from a multi-species river to a single-species river," said Ty Churchwell, president of the local Five Rivers chapter of TU. "This is the kind of thing that can be done only in headwaters, and the result will be that anglers will be able to come up here and experience this water as it was a hundred or more years ago."[...]
"We know this is a hot topic for some anglers," [Churchwell] said. "They ask us, 'Why kill fish just so you can plant fish?' But the Colorado River cutthroat is the only trout native trout to Southwest Colorado. And the fact is that 95 percent of this drainage will remain a multi-species fishery. Just 4 to 5 miles of it, on the east and west forks, is involved." Other concerns include the special regulations that will come with the cutthroats, including a temporary closure while the fish get established, and catch-and-release requirements on a stream that is popular with local and out-of-state campers who like nothing more than a few pan-sized trout for dinner. "It's not the intention of the Division of Wildlife or Trout Unlimited to go around the West turning multi-species rivers into single species ones," Churchwell said. "But you can only do this sort of project in a few special places. We want to establish populations of native trout in places just like this so there will be reserves of this fish on hand in case of a fire or another natural disaster in other places that have populations of native trout. Overall, we want to be moving the numbers of native cutthroats away from levels that could make them endangered."
Thanks to Colorado Trout Unlimited for the link. More Coyote Gulch coverage here.
"colorado water"
8:01:51 AM
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© Copyright 2009 John Orr.
Last update: 3/14/09; 10:25:42 PM.
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