Water source information for all the 14ers

Colorado peak questions, condition requests and other info.
Forum rules
  • This is a mountaineering forum, so please keep your posts on-topic. Posts do not all have to be related to the 14ers but should at least be mountaineering-related.
  • Personal attacks and confrontational behavior will result in removal from the forum at the discretion of the administrators.
  • Do not use this forum to advertise, sell photos or other products or promote a commercial website.
  • Posts will be removed at the discretion of the site administrator or moderator(s), including: Troll posts, posts pushing political views or religious beliefs, and posts with the purpose of instigating conflict within the forum.
    For more details, please see the Terms of Use you agreed to when joining the forum.
User avatar
highpilgrim
Posts: 3186
Joined: 3/14/2008
14ers: 58 
13ers: 84 1
Trip Reports (1)
 

Re: Water source information for all the 14ers

Post by highpilgrim »

screeman57 wrote: Getting sick because you didn't know that Matterhorn Creek has high levels of heavy metals is, in my opinion, as unnecessary a part of "the adventure" as getting caught in a blizzard because you didn't check the forecast.
Look for mine tailings and look at your map. Usually, there are markers for mine adits located on USGS maps. If there is mining activity in close proximity to your water source, get it somewhere else. If you are in a heavily mined area, don't drink the water, especially if the mining activity was large enough to be an ore processing area. Lots of heavy metals were used in ore processing. Mining activity above you in the drainage you're in, drink at your own risk.

But seriously, the Colorado mountains are not the Sahara desert. There's water EVERYWHERE. Carry a reasonable amount of water given the rate you drink it, and carry some water tablets in your first aid kit to treat any water you may need to supplement what you brought with you. It might not taste as good but it will get you through ok. You can also carry a steripen if you're worried about Iodine or Chlorine tabs not being totally effective. A steripen weighs ounces.
Last edited by highpilgrim on Tue Apr 09, 2013 1:56 pm, edited 1 time in total.
Call on God, but row away from the rocks.
Hunter S Thompson

Walk away from the droning and leave the hive behind.
Dick Derkase
viejo
Posts: 287
Joined: 5/10/2007
Trip Reports (0)
 

Re: Water source information for all the 14ers

Post by viejo »

screeman57 wrote:
Sure, but one must balance this sense of adventure with appropriate knowledge and preparation. Isn't that a large part of what this site is for? Getting sick because you didn't know that Matterhorn Creek has high levels of heavy metals is, in my opinion, as unnecessary a part of "the adventure" as getting caught in a blizzard because you didn't check the forecast.
Appropriate knowledge and preparation is not best attained from an internet forum.

This site is an excellent source of route information, and the mountain safety section is well written.

There is both good and poor information posted on the forum. It should not necessarily be viewed as reliable. On this particular thread you have information that Matterhorn Creek water should not be consumed, and that Matterhorn Creek water has been consumed with no obvious ill effects.

Using an internet forum as a primary source of information for outdoor skills is akin to using Wikipedia as a primary source of information for academic research.

Presto - your comments on adventure brings to mind the book "On the Loose" by Terry and Renny Russell; specifically the quote "Adventure is not in a guide book. Beauty is not in a map. Seek and ye shall find."
User avatar
Jesse M
Posts: 550
Joined: 7/18/2011
13ers: 15
Trip Reports (0)
 

Re: Water source information for all the 14ers

Post by Jesse M »

Please correct me if I am wrong. A solid blue line on a topo indicates a 'perennial' stream or river, a dotted or dashed blue line indicates a 'seasonal' stream or river. I also would say that if the stream or river has a name there is a good chance you can find water somewhere along the blue line on the topo. Again I think if you are concerned about water being safe to filter post a question to the forum or better yet call the local ranger and ask them for info.
User avatar
Scott P
Posts: 9438
Joined: 5/4/2005
14ers: 58  16 
13ers: 50 13
Trip Reports (16)
 
Contact:

Re: Water source information for all the 14ers

Post by Scott P »

Please correct me if I am wrong. A solid blue line on a topo indicates a 'perennial' stream or river, a dotted or dashed blue line indicates a 'seasonal' stream or river.
On older maps. Newer topos seem to use a light solid blue line for seasonal drainages and a darker solid blue line for perennial. I prefer the symbology on the older maps.
I also would say that if the stream or river has a name there is a good chance you can find water somewhere along the blue line on the topo.
On the 14ers, maybe, but not in the desert. Many (perhaps even most in some areas) of the "creeks" in the desert don't flow year round. I've never seen water in Wildhorse Creek or Little Wildhorse Creek in the San Rafael Swell for example. Halls Creek is dozens of miles long, but most of the time water only flows for a few miles in the Halls Creek Narrows. Even many of the named "rivers" don't flow year round, such as much of the Little Colorado River, much of the Paria, Little Delores, etc.

Here is a photograph of me at the Little Delores "River" in August 2009. The trickle of water and pool was the only water there. Most of the rest of the "river" was dry.

Image
I'm old, slow and fat. Unfortunately, those are my good qualities.
User avatar
mtgirl
Posts: 1883
Joined: 3/11/2006
14ers: 58  2 
13ers: 104
Trip Reports (0)
 

Re: Water source information for all the 14ers

Post by mtgirl »

Good point, Scott. Here's a shot of the Chute of the Muddy Creek in the San Rafael Swell (late June 2012). After a hot day descending Music Canyon, I was looking forward to wading/swimming this section as I had seen in pictures - just my luck, it was bone dry - but evidence of high water is obvious.

Image
"Life is not measured by the breaths you take, but by the moments that take your breath away."
User avatar
12ersRule
Posts: 2264
Joined: 6/18/2007
14ers: 58 
13ers: 157
Trip Reports (4)
 

Re: Water source information for all the 14ers

Post by 12ersRule »

Why would anyone drink water on a 14er?

:iluvbeer:
User avatar
Presto
Posts: 1863
Joined: 6/26/2007
14ers: 58  6 
13ers: 308 21
Trip Reports (6)
 

Re: Water source information for all the 14ers

Post by Presto »

by 49ersRule » Tue Apr 09, 2013 2:23 pm
Why would anyone drink water on a 14er?

:iluvbeer:
Indeed!
Attachments
88080.jpg
88080.jpg (147.04 KiB) Viewed 758 times
As if none of us have ever come back with a cool, quasi-epic story instead of being victim to tragic rockfall, a fatal stumble, a heart attack, an embolism, a lightning strike, a bear attack, collapsing cornice, some psycho with an axe, a falling tree, carbon monoxide, even falling asleep at the wheel getting to a mountain. If you can't accept the fact that sometimes "s**t happens", then you live with the illusion that your epic genius and profound wilderness intelligence has put you in total and complete control of yourself, your partners, and the mountain. How mystified you'll be when "s**t happens" to you! - FM
User avatar
TallGrass
Posts: 2328
Joined: 6/29/2012
13ers: 26
Trip Reports (0)
 

Re: Water source information for all the 14ers

Post by TallGrass »

Presto wrote:Wow ... reading threads like this (and others that I will not mention in specificity) makes me sit back and wonder how the h*ll I ever got the 14ers done back in 1991.
Sorry, Presto, but your accomplishments have been rendered moot by technology, as will current ones in the works according to the guy who just left in a blue T.A.R.D.I.S. Don't feel too bad though, you and others in turn rendered the accomplishments of those on Hayden's geographical surveys, W. "Holy Cross" Jackson, the Long single-handed feats of John Wesley Powell, and Collegiate wanderings of Josiah Dwight Whitney and crew moot as well (not to mention a few concurrent day hikes by Rijaca when the Incline was still a sapling of a tailing pile). Good job. Hope you're proud of yourself. Now I have to grab a Red Bull and a Sharpie to go edit all those historical markers, you furry witch. Don't worry about me, I've Roach's 286th edition of Colorado's Fourteeners with bonus section for Olympus Mons and a 4th gen BioLite stove that runs on dirt while filtering bovine runoff from old Lanthanide/Actinide mines to see me through. I'll be fine.
"A few hours' mountain climbing make of a rogue and a saint two fairly equal creatures.
Tiredness is the shortest path to equality and fraternity - and sleep finally adds to them liberty."
User avatar
milan
Posts: 329
Joined: 9/17/2008
14ers: 57  1 
13ers: 84 1
Trip Reports (8)
 
Contact:

Re: Water source information for all the 14ers

Post by milan »

Yeah, this site is full of information, just adding info about water sources on 14ers - it's too much, right? There are like five photographs of cruxes on each of the routes with lines in colors how to get over - just don't add water info, it's too much, stay thirsty my friends. That's where the line between a cool mountaineerer and a looser who should never touch a mountain is. This thread is funny. =D> :lol:
User avatar
screeman57
Posts: 425
Joined: 6/19/2012
14ers: 58  19 
13ers: 79 12
Trip Reports (0)
 

Re: Water source information for all the 14ers

Post by screeman57 »

SilverLynx wrote:
milan wrote:Yeah, this site is full of information, just adding info about water sources on 14ers - it's too much, right? There are like five photographs of cruxes on each of the routes with lines in colors how to get over - just don't add water info, it's too much, stay thirsty my friends. That's where the line between a cool mountaineerer and a looser who should never touch a mountain is. This thread is funny. =D> :lol:
=D> =D> =D>
:bow: :bow: :bow: :bow: :bow: :bow:
“To be is to do”—Socrates.
“To do is to be”—Jean-Paul Sartre.
“Do be do be do”—Frank Sinatra.
User avatar
wildlobo71
Posts: 2080
Joined: 4/1/2008
14ers: 58  5 
13ers: 88
Trip Reports (3)
 
Contact:

Re: Water source information for all the 14ers

Post by wildlobo71 »

I really wasn't getting why the whole idea of adding another tab full of information - water sources this time...would be a bad thing? It's optional, people... don't use it, or don't contribute to it - go back to dowsing for water if that's your thing but let those who would like to have access to the information have that access.

Yes, for those of you who completed the 14ers 30 years ago, and have climbed for 50 years - you have a distinct advantage in the historic applications of resourcefulness over those who have far, far, less, and have taken to using the internet for access to the information that you had to find for yourselves through long weekends of trial and error in the mountains and back country.

This discussion doesn't even matter if Bill doesn't see the value.
Bill W.

Time for the next great losing streak to begin.
#forcedrefocus
User avatar
TravelingMatt
Posts: 2204
Joined: 6/29/2005
14ers: 56 
13ers: 435
Trip Reports (2)
 

Re: Water source information for all the 14ers

Post by TravelingMatt »

Drinking from obvious water sources? Too mainstream.








(Get it?)
You never know what is enough until you know what is more than enough. -- William Blake
Post Reply