In Colorado’s San Luis Valley, NRCS Soil Conservation Civil Engineering Technician Hallie Flynn is working with the IWJV’s Wetland Resiliency GIS mapping tools to help address flood irrigation infrastructure concerns through a Targeted Conservation Program (TCP). Flynn uses a ditch profile survey to find the highest elevations on a given property (placing the structures at these locations helps build up irrigation water and spread the water out across a field). Then, she matches these locations with data from the resiliency layer. Doing so provides a visualization that helps her assess why parts of a field are becoming more dry or wet.

“It can be a good conversation starter with the landowner on what is happening on their fields,” Flynn said. “They are most often aware of these problem areas already.”

In one instance, a producer thought that he watered more consistently than the previous owner who leased the ground. His hay meadows, which are adjacent to the Rio Grande, have replaced historical flows, oxbows, and sloughs, even though remnants of these features remain. The wetland resiliency layer showed that these features often coincide with blue pixels and could indicate that the sub-aquifer is closer to the surface because of a different soil type and lower elevations for water to pool. 

When operating a flood irrigation system, proper structure placement increases efficiency by spreading water out more evenly. Doing so can enhance the groundwater recharge benefits of flood irrigation, as well as fish and waterfowl habitat. Using quantitative research to support the TCP raises awareness about which processes or topographic features are correlated to the increase or decrease in efficiency. It can also be an indicator for how land management or larger climatic processes are impacting a landscape. As a result, Flynn and the producers she works are able to identify the best plan for management.