Charette Lakes is closed for the season.
Streamflow on the Cimarron River, near Cimarron on Monday morning, was not measured due to ice. In accordance with the public health order, effective Dec. 3, New Mexico state parks reopened to N.M. residents for day-use only. Please check the state parks website for more information.
Clayton Lake is closed until March 2021.
Conchas Lake State Park has closed access to all boat ramps due to dropping water levels. Fishing for crappie was fair using two-inch plastic crawfish lures.
At Costilla Creek, the department has implemented the final phase of a project to expand Rio Grande cutthroat trout in 120 miles of the Costilla watershed in northern New Mexico. The final phase involved the removal of fish within a designated area (Rio Costilla from Costilla Dam downstream to the Valle Vidal Boundary including all tributaries and Comanche Creek from the road culvert crossing on Forest Road 1950 downstream to its confluence with Rio Costilla and al
Commission official says Carlsbad Irrigation District still likely to have water shortfall
Even with pumping from its wellfields in southeastern New Mexico, the New Mexico Interstate Stream Commission thinks the Carlsbad Irrigation District will have significantly less than 50,000 acre-feet of water available for the 2021 irrigation season, a state official said.
Hannah Riseley-White, deputy director of the commission and the Pecos River Basin bureau chief, gave an update Friday about the use of the wellfields at Seven Rivers near Brantley Reservoir and at Lake Arthur.
She said almost 6,000 acre-feet of water has been delivered from the two wellfields to Brantley since October.
Largemouth bass (Courtesy of the New Mexico Department of Game & Fish)
An avid trout fishermen, Rick Torres, of Albuquerque, actively dove into the trout challenge issued by the New Mexico Department of Game & Fish last summer.
And shortly after completing that by catching one of each of the five trout specimens in the state, Torres found out about the Bass Challenge.
“When I completed the Trout Challenge, it popped up, the Bass Challenge,” said Torres, 43, owner of True Love Tattoo. “My goal was to be No. 1. I’m going to go after this and I hit the road.”
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Unlike the trout waters, which he knew pretty well, Torres had to do a bit of digging to find the best spots for bass.
Here are some significant environmental and regulatory rulings and administrative actions from December 2020.
THE U.S. SUPREME COURT
Texas v. New Mexico
On December 14, 2020, the U.S. Supreme Court decided a water rights controversy involving sharing the water of the Pecos River. The 1949 Pecos River Compact provides for the equitable apportionment of the use of the Pecos River’s water by New Mexico and Texas, and a “River Master’s Manual,” approved by the Court in 1988, implements the Compact. These are very dry areas, and access to this water is very important. In 2014, a rare tropical storm drenched the Pecos River Basin, and Texas asked New Mexico to temporarily store the water that would otherwise flow into Texas. A few months later, New Mexico released the water to Texas, but the quantity was reduced because some of the water held by New Mexico had evaporated. The River Master awarded a delivery credit to New Mexico, and after Texas objected, Texas “in response”