Draining Lake Isabele

[plunderdog]

Can anyone tell me when and why they do this? Do they do this every year? Was up there yesterday and it it looks like they had had all but drained it dry within the week. I was a little bummed out but it did remind of low tide when I lived in Maine!

[coloradokevin]

Well, this was news to me, but apparently that lake is drained every year. I guess I've just never hiked up there during the season when it was waterless. This did come as a bit of a surprise to me, since Lake Isabelle is located within the Indian Peaks Widlerness (I didn't realize they could legally drain a wilderness lake for irrigation purposes, but I'm far from being a water rights expert).


http://www.gorp.com/parks-guide/travel- ... 56577.html" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;


"Isabelle is an irrigation lake and is usually drained in late August. If the lake itself is your goal, check with the Forest Service to determine whether it still holds water."

[traderaaron]

The Left Hand Ditch Company (built a tunnel out of Lake Isabelle) provides water to the Left Hand Water District, providers to primarily residential water users in Boulder County.

[JE242]

Wow. That's weak. Why even bother with Wilderness Regulations? I hope someones lawn is nice and green.

[kaiman]

Well, this was news to me, but apparently that lake is drained every year. I guess I've just never hiked up there during the season when it was waterless. This did come as a bit of a surprise to me, since Lake Isabelle is located within the Indian Peaks Widlerness (I didn't realize they could legally drain a wilderness lake for irrigation purposes, but I'm far from being a water rights expert).


http://www.gorp.com/parks-guide/travel- ... 56577.html" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;


"Isabelle is an irrigation lake and is usually drained in late August. If the lake itself is your goal, check with the Forest Service to determine whether it still holds water."

I am no water expert either, but know for a fact that there are many water rights in Colorado such as the "1840 Compact" that predate Wilderness Designation by 50-100 years (depending on when the areas were put into wilderness). In other cases there are water diversions from streams and lakes all over Colorado that are in wilderness areas such as the Hunter-Fryingpan and Collegiate Peaks Wilderness areas near where I live. Many of these were "grand-fathered" into the regulations and most of the water is used for residential use on the Front Range or sent south to Arizona and Southern California.

[traderaaron]

Water rights in the Boulder area are some of the oldest in the state and the west and actually predate Colorado as a state in some cases.

[Vincopotamus]

Wilderness designations are usually pretty solid in how they limit land uses, but water rights trump most anything.

In the Weminuche Wilderness, the Forest Service has contracted an outfit to clear trees and brush from an irrigation ditch that runs into the San Luis Valley. The outfit is required to use crosscut saws instead of chainsaws and dredge the ditches with horses instead of motorized equipment, per the wilderness act, but the rights for the water in that ditch are pretty bulletproof.

In a class on Watershed Management, my professor informed me that of all the water rights lawyers in the US, half of them live in Colorado

[plunderdog]

Here are a couple of shots I took of the current state of affairs.

[screefieldstevie]

Nothing here surprises me about water rights.......hell, this is the only place I know of where it's illegal to have "rain catchers"

[hatidua]

Wow. That's weak. Why even bother with Wilderness Regulations?

"Wilderness Regulations" are new thing.
Water Rights have been around a while.

[CO Native]

Nothing here surprises me about water rights.......hell, this is the only place I know of where it's illegal to have "rain catchers"

It's not illegal any more.

http://www.npr.org/templates/story/stor ... =104643521

[screefieldstevie]

Nothing here surprises me about water rights.......hell, this is the only place I know of where it's illegal to have "rain catchers"

It's not illegal any more.

http://www.npr.org/templates/story/stor ... =104643521

Yea, I thought that it had been overturned.......when I moved here in Feb '08 is was still illegal........and coming from the southeast I thought it was really weird............Thanks for the link