DeWeese-Dye Ditch and Reservoir Company

DeWeese Storage

There are six parties who presently have an interest in Lake DeWeese.   The money derived from the storage agreements was used to offset the cost of repairing the dam in 1999

1.    DeWeese Dye Ditch and Reservoir Company owns the land under and surrounding the lake in addition we own the property below the dam down to the county road.  We are responsible for the maintenance and operation of the dam and head gates. 

DeWeese-Dye Storage Rights

Our storage rights are one fill under the Winter Water storage agreement for 1771 acre feet based on the  October 8, 1901 priority and one natural fill under the same priority, for a total of 3542 acre feet

2.    Game and Fish paid $500,000 for 500 AF for a conservation pool, we pay the evaporation on their stored water This water is unusable for irrigation because of the mud discharged when the lake is that low.  In addition to owning half of the boating rights and the fishing rights on the lake they presently lease the surrounding property for a recreation area.

3.    BLM can store up to 500 AF of water if space is available, they use their water to keep some water in the creek during our storage period, we used to shut the head gate off and dry up the creek.  They had water in the Pueblo reservoir they wanted to use for this program.  We agreed that we would get 30% of any water they stored in the lake.  So the water they had in Pueblo was used to help make our 2250 obligation to the Colorado Canal (Colorado Springs) We then transfer the same amount to BLM from our stored water in the lake less 30 % In a normal year we buy water from SEWCD and then BLM reimburses us for the water, this water is then exchanged up to the lake in late summer when the lake is down and room is available, whatever is exchanged we get 30%. Another benefit to using there water for payback is we do not have the 5% transportation loss if we released the water from the lake and sent it to the Colorado Canal.

4.    UAWCD We gave them 10 AF of storage in exchange for 100 AF of water each year

5.      358 Acre feet of storage space was purchase by Round Mountain Water District at a cost of $358,000 to compensate for the water they are removing from the creek through their wells. Their purchased water is stored in the reservoir and is released by the Water Commissioner during the year, making up for the water that Round Mountain does not return to the creek

6.      Half of the boating rights are owned by the owners of the property at the DeWeese Village, this allows the property owners water ski and use other craft making wakes.

Winter storage

We are allowed to store water from November 15 to March 15 each year under a Winter Water Storage Agreement.  Under this program we can close our head gate and store all of the water coming down Grape Creek from November 15 to March 15.  Without this agreement, we could not store unless the call on the river was over 1901.  Our shareholders should understand the benefit we receive from the program and recognize without this agreement; there would be winters when we could store very little water

W2250 Winter Storage Program

Historically the large canals east of Pueblo consistently stored and irrigated throughout the winter season.    In spite of the difficulties involved, winter irrigation was found to be beneficial towards maintaining soil moisture for the next season’s crop.  Ultimately it was determined that the same or greater benefit could be derived by storing these same waters during the winter and having this additional water available during the summer irrigation season.  

The design of the Frying pan-Arkansas Project included Pueblo Reservoir as its principal regulating reservoir.   Pueblo Reservoir was designed to have sufficient storage space to allow for the storage of these winter waters.

Following completion of Pueblo Reservoir in the 1970’s the canal companies East of Pueblo began a winter storage program instead of the historic practice of direct winter irrigation.    Each company was allocated a certain percentage of total diversions to storage from the river.  In 1990 this “Winter Water Storage Program” was finally decreed by the Water Court.  One of the things this decree required was a fixed call date for water on the river of March 1, 1910.

Historically the call during the earlier periods of winter irrigation was typically anywhere from 1884-1906.

The Colorado Canal Company was often one of these calling water rights with a 1890 call date.

This more junior 1910 fixed call would allow upstream junior storage rights to store more water than historically occurred or was allowed.  This would include the 1901 storage right for DeWeese Reservoir.

In exchange for this greater opportunity to store water these upstream storage entities agreed to pay back to the Colorado Canal Company a total of 2,250 acre-feet of the total amount of water that these upstream entities stored each season.  

This 2,250 acre-foot repayment amount is divided proportionally between the upstream entities relative to the amount of water each entity stored that winter.  This 2,250 acre-foot repayment is typically released or traded to the Colorado Canal Company following the winter storage season in March or April by each upstream entity.

The instruments are in place and working at the reservoir.  http://resources.uawcd.com/data_reservoir.php    Instructions: Select the DeWeese Reservoir and click on data. It looks like nothing happened but then scroll down to see data. You can also look at the inflow above the lake and the outflow below the lake, however it is not accurate during the winter due to ice in the water.

See how much water is in the lake: 

The report page does not show the 76 ahead of the water level as the chart does so 64.12 is 7664 then read the AF in the column below 0.1