Colorado ยท county water record
Water in Gunnison 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.
- 6,224 Live water rights across 3,289 square miles
- 5,514 Wells drilled across 3,289 square miles
- 46,043 ac Irrigated ground across 3,289 square miles
- 114 ft Well depth middle value across 607 of 3,289 square miles
- 16 days Days called out middle value across 377 of 3,289 square miles
Point at any square mile to read what is on it. Hover the maps below to compare them.
Gunnison 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
3,289 surveyed sections, drawn 2 by 2 miles 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.
Worth knowing
A listing's priority date will overstate seniority here
43% of water rights were decreed more than a decade after the water was first claimed. Listings quote the claim date. A call is administered on the decree date, and the median gap here is 17 years.
CDSS water rights, net amounts 8 of 60 counties
43% here 8th of 60 One bar per Colorado county from lowest to highest. Point at one to name it.
Worth knowing
Nobody measures what most structures here divert
68% 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 11 of 60 counties
68% here 11th of 60 One bar per Colorado county from lowest to highest. Point at one to name it.
Context
Dams here are rated unsatisfactory
3 of this county's 29 dams carry an unsatisfactory condition rating. A storage right behind a failing dam is water you cannot count on.
Colorado Dam Safety 16 of 42 counties
3 here 16th of 42 One bar per Colorado county from lowest to highest. Point at one to name it.
Worth knowing
A lot of this county is wet ground
56% of sections carry poorly drained soil, 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 20 of 59 counties
56% here 20th of 59 One bar per Colorado county from lowest to highest. Point at one to name it.
Context
Half the wells drilled here never had a pump put in
56% 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 34 of 60 counties
56% here 34th of 60 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 Gunnison County