Section 01 of 04
High Plains
Water that fell before anybody farmed it. Four pages, and the measurements behind them.
- 01The water under Kansas fell as rain before anybody farmed itMuch of the High Plains aquifer holds water recharged during and since the last glaciation, which is why drawing it down is not a cycle but a subtraction.
- 02How far the water has fallen, county by countyThe decline is not uniform: some counties have lost most of their saturated thickness and others almost none, and the map of that is the real story.
- 03The wells that measure it, and who reads themThe record exists because somebody drives out to a monitoring well and drops a tape down it, year after year.
- 04What grows on water that will not come backThe cropping pattern above an aquifer is a decision about how fast to spend it.