“Developing a Plan for Restoration through Assessment, Awareness, and Involvement”
Objectives
- Establish a research baseline for the Watershed for water quality and quantity monitoring.
- Educate rural and urban stakeholders on issues relating to water quality and quantity issues in the Pecos River Basin.
- Develop a Watershed Protection Plan for Pecos River segments 2312, 2311 and 2310.
Components
- Basin Assessment: Texas AgriLife Research researchers will develop a baseline assessment on the Pecos River Basin with regards to stream channel morphology, riparian vegetation, land use, salinity mapping, water inflows and outflows, aquatic habitats, historical perspectives and economic modeling.
- Educational Programming: Texas AgriLife Extension Service will work with various state and local agencies to assemble a series of publications and organize and conduct a series of educational meetings targeted at landowners, stakeholders and policymakers in the Pecos River Basin.
- Monitoring Programs: Through data collection and analysis as well as water use studies, personnel will estimate the effect of salt concentration and fate of water salvaged through saltcedar control in the Pecos River Watershed.
The Pecos River flows from its origins in New Mexico through hot, dry, semi-arid landscapes in Texas. It is the largest Texas river basin that flows into the Rio Grande. As such, water use and hydrologic issues in the Pecos Basin will profoundly influence the future of the Rio Grande Basin.
The flows of the once great Pecos River have dwindled to a mere trickle due to natural and man-induced causes. Today, the upper reaches of the Pecos River in Texas now resemble a very poor quality creek rather than a river. If the integrity of the entire Rio Grande basin below the Pecos is to be improved and maintained, then it is crucial to protect water quality and quantity throughout the Pecos Basin in order to provide a viable level of in-stream flows.
Because water quality and streamflows have declined, the aquatic community of the Pecos River has been drastically altered. The Pecos Basin no longer has a healthy and diverse community of aquatic plants, invertebrates, microorganisms, fish and amphibians. Aquatic diversity has been negatively affected by changes in river hydrology, the destruction of riparian communities, oil and gas exploration activities, irrigation demands, long- and short-term droughts, damming of the river and the desertification of the upland watershed. These factors have allowed saltcedar and other introduced plant species to dominate the riparian systems within the watershed.
According to the data of International Boundary and Water Commission (IBWC), the Pecos Basin contributes an average of 11% of the annual streamflow into the Rio Grande near Amistad Reservoir (274 million cubic meters). The Pecos Basin also contributes more than 29% of the annual salt loading into Amistad Reservoir (0.54 million tons). Salinity levels in Amistad Reservoir exceeded 1,000 parts per million during 1998 and have fluctuated since then. It is important to control salt loading from the Pecos Basin if the goal is to maintain salinity levels of less than 1,000 ppm in Amistad Reservoir.
The decreasing water quality in the Pecos River has negatively affected the Rio Grande, which the United States and Mexico rely on for drinking water, irrigation, industries, recreation, and ecological purposes. The Pecos River is also the lifeblood of many communities within its reaches, and serves as a major water source for irrigation, recreational uses, and recharge for underlying aquifers. In sum, the condition of the Pecos Basin and the lower Rio Grande River is extremely crucial to hundreds of thousands of residents of the United States and Mexico.