Last summer we examined how a mid-sized Texas city supplies water to its citizens. From what it takes to fill up a lake, to how the water flows through the city, to how progressive cities are reducing waste, we have followed water from the cloud to the lake to the tap to the drain and back to the lake. All that is lacking to you give you the full picture is to look at the future water issues of Abilene, Texas. While this may seem rather specific, Abilene is just an example of issues that affect most western cities of a certain size.
To fully illustrate the point, we need to consider how Abilene has found water in the past.
To save time, I have condense the timeline into a simple animation: (you may prefer to click on the image and display it in its own window.)
History of Abilene, Texas water supply from the 19th century into the future
In the past
1897 Lytle Lake
1918 Lake Abilene
1927 Lake Kirby
1937 Fort Phantom Hill Reservoir
1952 Clear Fork of the Brazos and Deadman creek Diversion Dams
1962 Hubbard Creek Reservoir
2003 O.H Ivie pipeline
2015 Wastewater recycling to Fort Phantom
In the future
Possum Kingdom pipeline
Cedar Ridge Reservoir
Will it be enough?
Since my last posts concerning water issues, Fort Phantom Hill Reservoir became 98% full; however, el nino has wandered off to play elsewhere and that mean little girl, la nina, may soon be here to further dry things out. 2016 is already on record as the 11th most dry winter, and drought is starting to steal back into Texas.
During the time between the moist autumn and the soon to be dry spring, many people have quickly forgotten how bad it can get. The City of Abilene is proposing a water park and people are calling for completely ending watering restrictions. Do you think it is wise? Leave me a comment.
In an upcoming post I will look at droughts of the past and also explore exactly what a “normal” year of rainfall looks like.
This immature Cooper’s hawk was seen in downtown Abilene, Texas last winter splashing in a puddle by the curb; however, they are usually more woodland birds. Some of Abilene’s older neighborhoods with larger trees would be a good place to look. Look (and listen) near bird feeders as these hawks are known to hunt them for feeding birds. While their call is fairly distinctive, you’ll more likely notice the cries of protest from the other birds in the area.
Like many other birds, the Cooper’s hawk looks drastically different when young as compared to adults. This can make identifying them rather tricky. This is especially true for this species, as they are very easily confused with a sharp-shinned hawk. While I highly recommend owning a field guide (or one of the many free apps ) don’t let identification intimidate you. Just get out and enjoy the nature in your neighborhood. “I don’t know” is a perfectly acceptable answer if someone asks you about what you are looking at!
When to look
While these hawks can be seen year-round in most of the United Sates, winter is a very good time to be on the look out for birds of prey in Texas. Many species pass through the Big Country during migration, and many winter here.
Just the facts
Cooper’s Hawk Accipter cooperii
Length: 16.5 inches
Wingspan: 31 inches
Females larger than males
Look around the edges of wooded areas and older neighborhoods.
Remember, there is a lot of nature right outside your door if you take the time to look.
Texas horned lizard. Horny toad. Horned frog. These are all common names for the same creature, Phrynosoma cornutum. Texas horned lizard is perhaps the more “correct” common name, but for some people, this lizard will always be whatever name they grew up calling it. This lizard brings on strong opinions; it seems like everyone I have met believes their name for it is the best name, and everyone seems to love the actual animal. Many people older than perhaps 25 remember playing with them as children, and have noticed that they no longer see horned lizards around.
Most people have heard that horned lizards populations have greatly declined in Texas. Texas Parks and Wildlife, The Horned Lizard Conservation Society, the Forth Worth Zoo and others have done an excellent job educating the public about the decline of the horned lizard in Texas; however, there are two problems in this situation:
Information gets diluted
Horned lizard conservation efforts are getting good press today, and now anyone who has ever read anything about horned lizards shares that in the comments sections of these stories. Some of this information is helpful and some of it is… less than helpful. It can be difficult to pick out what someone has actually learned from science and what they have picked up from something their great grandfather told their father, who told it to him. I do not mean to take anything away from the wisdom of grandfathers, but in some things conditions change over time, new information is learned, and honestly, not everyone’s grandfather is wise.
The case is not closed
While we have a better understanding of what has led to the decline in horned lizards new research is constantly being conducted. Some of the research supports what we have suspected and some of it indicates that we still have a lot to learn about such a popular animal. For example, during a seminar about horned lizards I attended we were all told that horned lizards will very rarely (nearly never) feed right at the entrance of an ant colony and we should concentrate our search efforts along ant trails instead of the colony. Since then I have had the opportunity to work with horned lizards in a professional capacity and have observed horned lizards feeding on ants at the colony enough times I am unashamed to disregard that suggestion.
So, what did happen to them?
As, I mentioned above, there is still work happening to figure that out, and while we may never know exactly all the details, we are are fairly sure that it was no one single event or thing that triggered the decline in horned lizards. Let’s take a look at some of the factors
Fire ants
Harvester ants
In the 1930s an invasive species (actually several species) of ants from South America were introduced into the United States along the coast of Alabama due to shipping traffic. It wasn’t until the 1950s that these ants first entered Texas. Since then they have steadily spread north and west covering much of the state. Fire ants are probably the most well known suspect when it comes to the demise of the horned lizard. There is just one problem with that: There are areas of southern Texas that have had fire ants for decades and did not lose their horned lizards. Certainly, fire ants have had an impact; however, it is likely our response to them that made the greater impact.
We went to great lengths in our attempts to eradicate the fire ant, and our careless use of poison likely caused a great decline in the red harvester ant. The red ant is a main (but not only) food source for the Texas horned lizard, and killing them is a sure way to remove horned lizards from an area.
Habitat fragmentation
During the same time we were killing the red harvester ant by mistake we were also destroying habitat. In the last 30 years Texas has experienced a surge of urban building. Today more than 80% of Texans live in the city, and the cities have grown, which removes horned lizard habitat. Horned lizards need open (but not too open) ground, preferably with bunch grass and low thorny shrubs to protect against predators. The short and dense turf grasses planted on most yards are not suitable.
Habitat degradation
In the city
Many homeowners love the dense turf mentioned above and will use a large number of insecticides to keep it thick. This leads back to the ant issue. This habitat degradation also has happened outside of the cities.
In the country
Cotton and wheat, while vital crops to the local economy form large monocultures that provide little shelter some of the year and no shelter after harvest and the same pesticide issues are present as well. In pasture lands, overgrazing has been identified as a problem.
Lands placed in the Conservation Reserve Program (CRP) were allowed to grow too dense, displacing horned lizards. While one would think lands removed from agricultural production would be good for horned lizards; however, it is possible to preserve it “too well.” Rachel Granberg’s work suggests that prescribed fire is needed to keep grasslands from becoming too thick.
What is the Conservation Reserve Program? CRP is a program which will pay long term rent (10-15 years) on ecologically sensitive lands if the landowner will take it out of production and take actions to protect it, such as planting native grasses. This has greatly helped with erosion, water quality and wildlife habitat across the country
The times, they are a-changin’
After decades of decline, we may be poised to see a comeback of the Texas horned lizard in Texas. Many of the culprits I discussed above are still present, but we are as a culture moving away from large scale insecticide use in some areas, partly from education and partly from the environmental laws passed in the 1970s. We are also learning that prescribed fire is not evil, and grazing practices are becoming more refined every decade.
In some areas people are starting to see horned lizards again, but in other areas, it may take a bit of help to bring them back. Texas Parks and Wildlife started a reintroduction study last summer to investigate the viability of releasing wild-caught lizards into areas they were known to once roam. It is too early to know the results, but people are hopeful.
While the observations of lizards returning is only anecdotal at this point, between that and the possible reintroduction in other areas by TPWD, we stand a good chance of seeing horned lizards making a comeback in Texas. This recovery hinges on Texans continuing to follow good practices, and to extend them to other areas, such as xeriscaping portions of their yards.
The mexican ground squirrel is a rather small squirrel Texans most often see in open park areas darting through the low grass to suddenly disappear. Their burrows are often just holes in the ground without any noticeable mound around it. The ground squirrels in the above photo are grouped around one such hole.
These interesting little squirrels tend to excavate more than one entrance to their tunnels, so that a predator (or blog writer) lying in wait over one entrance may be unaware of an audience behind him.
Despite the feature photo above, mexican ground squirrels are often solitary creatures which will usually evict any other ground squirrels that attempt to share the same area. The above photo is an example of one of the more rare times that they will live in a colony setting. They spend the first part of the year eating plants, but in truth, mexican ground squirrels are omnivores; they will eat insects later in the year, and even meat if it is available.
Prairie dog, not a ground squirrel
They are often the most noticeable small mammal in parks in west central Texas; however, they are sometimes mistaken for the much larger prairie dog. The prairie dog has long been in decline in this part of the state, and many urban residents have never seen a prairie dog in person, so it is not unthinkable that there may be some confusion.
Prairie dogs are large bodied and do not have spots while mexican ground squirrels are slender and have nine rows of white spots on their back. Also, note the difference below between the burrows:
prairie dog
not a prairie dog!
Explore your Neighborhood
So, where is the best place to find nature? In yourneighborhood! When we see amazing nature photos or videos we often think of those images being from out there; someplace far away and too rugged for use to actually see ourselves. Truth is that there is plenty of nature to experience in your backyard, down your street, and in your local park. Often we are moving too fast to notice or appreciate it, but I promise you, it is there.
This post is the first in a new series titled, “Explore your Neighborhood,” in which I’ll share with you a few of the great bits of nature that can be found by most urban residents.
In my previous posts I mentioned the three reservoirs which supply Abilene’s water, what it takes to fill them up, how that water gets to the lakes, and what happens to that water when we’re finished with it. There is one last source to talk about and that is the Clear Fork of the Brazos River, which is a tributary of the Brazos.
As you can see, the Clear Fork of the Brazos passes very close to Fort Phantom Lake, but does not fill it. Wouldn’t it be great for Abilene if it did? Apparently, over 65 years ago, someone thought so, because in 1950 construction began on a diversion dam across the Clear Fork of the Brazos near Fort Phantom Lake. This was nearly 20 years after the dam for the lake was built.
Pumps at the diversion dam “scalp” some of the water from the river and divert it into the lake. Permits dating from 1949 indicate that the City of Abilene was originally authorized to divert 30,000 acre-feet per year. That is approximately 9.7 Billion gallons of water! I reached out to Howdy Wayne Lisenbee, Assistant Director of Water Utilities for the City of Abilene and Mr. Lisenbee confirmed that the city is still permitted up to 30,000 acre-feet per year.
The diversion dam and pump station. Aerial photography courtesy Rocky White
There are conditions that have to be met before that water is allowed to flow. First, it has to rain on the upstream watershed of the Clear Fork of the Brazos. Once the water is flowing, the city of Abilene is obligated to allow 600 acre feet of water through the dam for downstream users, and must allow some water to flow through the dam while they are pumping. Many Abilene residents show frustration when the City of Abilene does not pump water from the Brazos after a rain, but we are under legal and ethical obligations to let people downstream from us have some of the water.
How does it happen?
When the conditions mentioned earlier are met, water is impounded behind the dam shown in the lefthand side of the above photo. Eight pumps (located on the righthand side of the same photo) push the water a little over 300 yards through a pipeline into Fort Phantom Lake. Of the eight pumps, five are 1,500 horsepower and are capable of moving roughly 100 million gallons per day. the other three, while smaller, are not lightweights: they are 1,000 hp and can pump 50 million gallons of water per day! If all of these pumps were running at the same time it would be possible to fill 984 olympic sized swimming pools in a single day.
Due to permit restrictions and maintenance reasons, usually only a few pumps are utilized at any one time. If during a pumping session one pump were to break pumping could continue with the other pumps. Mr. Lisenbee stated that during the scalping in May the city used a combination of two to four large pumps and a couple of the smaller pumps to add 651 million gallons to Fort Phantom reservoir over the course of three days.
The pipeline which carries water from the Brazos to Fort Phantom Lake
Aerial view of Brazos diversion pipeline. Water flows straight up from this pipe.
What is an “acre foot?”
An acre foot is the amount of water it would take to cover an acre of land (43,560 square feet) with 12 inches of water.
Once the water reaches the end of the pipeline it flows straight up out of the large pipe shown on the right.
This water comes roaring down the into the lake:
The same type of scalping occurs on a smaller scale on the east side of the lake. In 1954 the City of Abilene acquired a permit to divert up to 3,000 acre-feet of water per year from Deadman Creek when conditions allow. In return for this use Abilene is obligated to release a certain amount of treated wastewater back into Deadman creek.
Same as it ever was
This additional water security did not come easily for the citizens of Abilene. Before the Clear Fork of the Brazos diversion dam was even completed landowners downstream began to complain and seek legal action. According to articles from the Abilene Reporter-News from the 1950s, an argument raged between Abilene and the landowners near Albany throughout the ’50s. These battles echo the new arguments over some of Abilene’s projected water projects.
As the population of the area grows and as climate change continues to alter our landscape, these arguments over water will also continue. In my final article on Abilene water I will explore what the search for new water in the past was like as compared to the searches in our near future.
[This is part of my continuing series on how Abilene, Texas obtains its water. The series starts here and continues here]
Reusing waste water isn’t a new thing. Several agencies have treated sewer water to use in various ways. For example, both El Paso and San Antonio inject their treated effluent water into the ground to recharge aquifers. In 2001 Abilene completed a pipeline from the sewer treatment plants north of Abilene to Lake Kirby in southern Abilene. This water is used for recreation at the lake and is also used for irrigation for local parks, golf courses, universities, and Dyess Air Force Base.
This past winter an additional pipeline to Fort Phantom Lake was completed, improved treatment facilities installed, and now treated sewer water flows directly into Fort Phantom Lake. As you may have learned in my earlier post, Fort Phantom is one of the main sources of drinking water for Abilene. It sounds gross to some, but in a dry area that is likely to only become more dry as both the populations and the effects of climate change increase, we need to utilize every drop of water as many times as possible.*
[This is part of a series of posts exploring how a midsized Texas city gets its water. For the first post, click over to see what it takes to fill up a lake.]
In the broadest sense, Abilene has two sources of water: recycled and surface water. Surface water is the water that we draw from the three lakes (Fort Phantom Hill, Hubbard Creek, and O.H. Ivie) as well as the water we scalp from the Clear Fork of the Brazos river. We’ll look at scalping in another post.
How does the water get to these lakes?
Of course rain falls on the watershed of these lakes, but it then has to find its way to the lake. In the case of Fort Phantom Lake, it actually flows through Abilene. While driving around
town, the water (and trash) you see in the ditches and creeks is on its way to your tap.
Besides creeks and ditches, rain that falls downtown flows into the stormwater sewer system through the drains built into curbs. This water flows straight into the nearest creek to be transported to the lake and thus receives no treatment. This is why you should never dispose of anything but water into sewer drains; it is going straight to your drinking water!
The scenic route
Along the way, the water is diverted in various ways including ponds, detention ponds and riparian wetlands. The latter are the marshy areas often found along the edges of creeks and other water bodies. You might see reeds and cattails along the edges of these places. These wetlands (often ephemeral in this part of the country) provide important ecosystem services to use all. While I’ll let Bill Nye explain it better than I can, you should know that these areas help prevent erosion, fight pollution, provide valuable urban wildlife habitat, and help slow down water to prevent downstream flooding.
Unfortunately, Abilene has removed many of these wetlands in favor of straightening creeks. This is because it is easier to remove trash and treat for mosquitoes in wide straight ditches lined with short grass than in wetlands. It is also an attempt to reduce flooding. Abilene, like many other cities, use detention ponds to slow flood water, collect trash, slow pollution, and other services provided by wetlands. There are approximately 200 detentions ponds scattered through Abilene, though the Abilene Storm Water Department only inspects and maintains slightly under 50 of these ponds.
Detention pond in eastern Abilene before a rainstorm.
As I will mention in the following video, part of Abilene’s stormwater management plan is to allow water to flow down certain secondary streets, and these small holding areas are crucial to slowing the water down enough to prevent flooding.
Detention pond after a rainstorm
You might be surprised that there are so many of these ponds scattered across Abilene, since there are so few bodies of water. Many of these ponds are just a few feet deep and spend most of the year as open grassy areas. You may have seen children playing in a detention pond and didn’t realize it was a pond! These ponds provide a place for water to collect during heavy rains to prevent flooding and they slow the flood water down, allowing some trash and debris to fall out of the water before it gets to the lake.
And there is one source of your drinking water. Next week we’ll take a look at another source of water.
A while back I posted an explanation of where and how much it would need to rain in order to fill up Fort Phantom lake. Not accounting for absorption or detention in ponds and other low lying areas it would take a 2.6 inch rain on the entire watershed to fill up the lake, according to my previous calculations. Well, currently Cedar, Elm and Catclaw creeks are out of their banks in places. The following map shows a few rainfall totals for places in the Fort Phantom watershed
Without data for the western edge of the watershed, it is impossible for me to offer a good estimate of exactly how much water will flow to Fort Phantom lake; however, judging from how little Lake Abilene has risen, I think it is safe to say that portion of the watershed will not contribute as much water to Fort Phantom as the eastern half. As of today (July 7th) the lake is at 45.3%, but click on the link to see the current lake level. Get ready to see a change in the lake level in as the week goes on! And check back here later this week to read about why it can take so long between a rainfall event and a change in the lake level.
What a difference a week made for some places in Texas! Parts of Texas experienced massive flooding which resulted in deaths, bridges lost, and at least one dam failure. Many reservoirs experienced dramatic changes in water level, with some becoming full nearly overnight. Possum Kingdom is full and was releasing water into the Brazos, and evacuations are occurring downstream. For the first time since June 2010, the USDA Drought Monitor does not show any severe drought in Texas (and it should be noted that time in 2010 without severe drought lasted only six months.) We have been free of severe drought only 26 months spread out over the last 11 years, and completely free of drought only three months during that same period.
Despite all of this rain and despite the drought relief, for many Texans, it is the same story as last week: The ground is damp, but the lakes are dry. Here is an updated map comparing the new drought index with current lake levels:
The largest red circles represent lakes that are below 25% of capacity, the medium dots are lakes that are between 25 and 50% full, and the smallest dots are lakes which are between 40 and 75%.
A comparison between the USDA Drought Index and Texas Lake Levels.
As you can see, while those along the Brazos are wet, people along the upper reaches of the Colorado River are still dry, even if the drought index has shrunken. With another month of spring left, hopefully things will continue to change for those of us in the dry areas; however, in this area the el niño effect often wanes during the summer before returning during winter. In other words, we may have a wet summer in the western portion of the state, or we may not.
Here is a comparison of May rainfall totals for a few select stations across the drought area. For ease of data collection these are mostly airport locations, so the totals may vary slightly from nearby cities. Notice that other than a few large outliers (Austin at nearly 17 inches of rain for example) that some of the dry areas aren’t that far behind some of the wetter areas. This goes back to my previous post about watersheds: it takes rain in a certain area to influence lake levels.
Rainfall totals so far this May (inches).
Certainly, we are better off today than we were this time last year, but now is not the time to abandon water conservation. In terms of water it seems the state has very few places that Goldilocks would consider just right.
Next week I begin a three part series on how one city in Texas obtains its drinking water. If you enjoyed this post, please surf over to the Instante Mense facebook page and like it.
Most of Texas has been in exceptional and extreme drought for the past five years. Now due to el niño, we are finishing spring with cool, wet weather. For the first time in what seems like forever much of Texas is officially drought-free. In fact, some areas are experiencing severe flooding; however, that is not the complete story. What I would like to do today is discuss the flooding and drought issues here in Texas on a watershed level.
Despite these floods and despite the fact that overall Texas reservoirs are 78% full, many lakes are at less than 50% of capacity. People living in the Rolling Plains and Edwards Plateau ecoregions of Texas are still experiencing drought conditions. I built this map below to give an idea of the land area in Texas suffering from drought conditions and to show the number of lakes that are less than half full.
In the areas still in drought above live approximately 3.5 million people and all of the lakes shown are water sources for these people. There are other water sources, some lakes which have received some water, and other areas depend upon aquifers (a nonrenewable source), but these empty lakes remain important.
What does it take to fill up a lake?
When it rains, the water does several things. On pervious surfaces, such as lawns and fields, it soaks into the ground to provide soil moisture needed for plants. If the rate of precipitation is greater than what can be absorbed, or if the rain lands on hard surfaces, it begins to run off. Take a parking lot for example: rain runs off of the parking lot into a drainage ditch (or storm sewer), the ditch runs into a gully, that gully runs into a creek, that creek runs into a river, and that river may run into a lake before it ends at the ocean. Cities will then pump water from the lake, treat it, and then citizens will use that water in their houses.
Every lake has a certain area from which it will collect water. This area is called a watershed. Since most of my readers are from the Abilene area, I will use Lake Fort Phantom as an example. This lake is currently at 37% capacity. The watershed of Fort Phantom is approximately 500 square miles. If this entire area were to receive a 1 inch rain and if it were all run into the lake, it would receive 8.66 BILLION gallons of water! That is enough water to last 26,600 families for a year. This also happens to be roughly the amount of water in Lake Fort Phantom right now, and there are 10 times as many people depending upon that water.
Using the example above it would take 2.6 inches of rain over the entire watershed to completely fill up Lake Fort Phantom. Recently much of the Big Country has received lots of rain; the nearby town of Merkel has received 11 inches of rain in the last six weeks, but as I mentioned above, Lake Fort Phantom is only 37% full.
So, where did the water go?
Examine this map I made of the Fort Phantom watershed:
The rain has to fall into the red shaded area in order to reach the lake. While the lake has 500 square miles to draw from, in reality that is not a lot of area. Merkel may have received a lot of rain, but that water will end up in the Brazos river and not Lake Fort Phantom. Another issue is that not all the rain that falls in the watershed actually ends up in the lake. As I mentioned before, some water is absorbed, but a sustainable amount of water is also diverted into ponds, ephemeral wetlands, rainwater collection catchments and flood control basins. Once it is in these areas the water is used by many people and animals, and these areas should not be considered a waste of water.
The drought may be over for most of Texas, and in the coming weeks the drought may be over for us on the Rolling Plains, but please keep in mind that it takes rain falling in exact areas to refill our water supplies. Though it may seem like we are receiving a lot (and in some areas too much) water, we should not back away from water conservation efforts. We may have a cool wet summer, but then again, we may not.
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