"When we started out, everyone thought that water was an
inexhaustible supply--just a bottomless pit," said Ed Molitor, who
drilled the first irrigation well on his farm
east of Dodge City in 1964. "But the more straws you put in a bucket, the
sooner it's going to go dry."
That conclusion kept Molitor and his two sons from irrigating more than 10
percent of their land, though they could have tripled that acreage. Over
the years they replaced "flood" irrigation with more efficient sprinkler
systems. And instead of growing corn, the Molitors now rotate soybeans and
wheat, which require less water and chemicals.
"We've made a lot of our changes because of economics," said 33-year-old
Kirk Molitor. But he added, "We just felt it wasn't right for one
generation to use up the water supply, and not have anything left."
The conservation practiced by the Molitors and others cannot guarantee
that another generation will irrigate in western Kansas. But it does
signal a shift in Kansans' traditional approach to water.
Since the state was settled, Kansans have tried to overcome the vagaries
of rainfall by looking for ways to increase the water supply. Forty years
ago, the Ogallala aquifer--a groundwater reserve comparable to Lake
Huron--promised to fulfill the wildest dreams of the early rainmakers and
windmill irrigators.
Ed, Peggy, Kirk and Eric Molitor stand beside an irrigation pump on their
farm near Offerle.
(Victoria Foth)
But by the 1970s too many "straws in the bucket" were
consuming the Ogallala 10 to 14 times faster than nature could replenish
it. As a result, household wells ran dry in many areas. The Arkansas River
stopped flowing, and falling water tables helped drain 550 miles of other
western Kansas streams.
One attempt to address depletion was the 1982 High Plains Study, which
explored the transfer of Missouri River water to western Kansas and other
states sharing the Ogallala. This grandiose scheme failed to dazzle
Kansans. In a 1986 survey, High Plains residents preferred improvements in
irrigation efficiency over expensive plans to import water.
Today irrigators, who use over 90 percent of the water drawn from the
Ogallala, conserve to a degree unheard of a few years ago. "We learned
real quick to start doing things to save water because we had to, to save
money," said Garden City farmer Rodger Funk.
Funk and others believe that it will soon be too costly to pump a
dwindling water supply with high-priced energy--preventing the total
exhaustion of the Ogallala. Funk and his son already plan for the time
when they will abandon irrigation. The family would have completed the
switch from corn to less water-intensive crops long ago, were it not for
government farm programs.
Funk, 60, finds it ironic that he's been subsidized to raise surplus crops
with finite water. "The sad thing about it, we're using that water up to
produce something that nobody really wants," he said. "I've always known
that it's foolish to pump that water out, but economics has always forced
me to do it."
The economic forces that once encouraged depletion are now shifting to
favor conservation. But can economics alone address the larger issue of
preserving water for future generations?
Darren Alexander of Satanta wants to give his sons a chance to farm, just
as his father, Alfred,
worked to build a joint venture with Darren and brother Danny. 'Thanks to
irrigation, the land produces enough income to support all three families.
"If we have to shut down half of our irrigation to save water for our
boys, it's worth doing right now," said Darren, 26. "But where do you
start? Does one farmer do that and the rest of them don't?"
In the mid '70s, western Kansas water users formed management districts
and enacted rules that all irrigators must follow. The districts restrict
new wells but do not require established users to cut back on the water
they pump. That lack of restriction, coupled with the absence of economic
incentives, works against the individual who would sacrifice for the sake
of long-term benefits.
Ed Molitor believes that education is the key to a society that lives
within its resource means. He would have schools teach children "to feel
guilty going off and leaving a faucet running. That's the only way to cure
it. It's going to have to be ongoing from generation to generation."
Clearly, if a conservation ethic is to take root in Kansas, it must be
grounded in more than short-term economics and crises. Sustainable water
use grows out of a sense of responsibility to a community that includes
future as well as present-day Kansans.
The decline of the Ogallala has brought the dilemma of finite water home
to western Kansas. But similar issues lie ahead for other parts of the
state, as growing cities reach ever farther to quench their thirst. The
lessons of over-development can serve Kansans well in the transition to a
society that sustains its water for generations to come.
Selected References
Alexander, Alfred, Darren, and Danny, interview by Vicky
Foth, March 31, 1988, Satanta, Kansas.
Duncan, Myrl L., "High Noon on the Ogallala Aquifer," Washburn Law
Journal. Vol. 27, No. I, 1987.
Fund, Mary, and Elise Watkins Clement, Distribution of Land and Water
Ownership in Southwest Kansas (Whiting, KS: The Kansas Rural Center,
1982).
Funk, Rodger, interview by Vicky Foth, April I, 1988, Garden City, Kansas.
Kromm, David E. and Stephen E. White, "Variability in Adjustment
Preferences to Groundwater Depletion in the American High Plains,"
Water Resources Bulletin. American Water Resources Association, Vol.
22, No.5, October 1986, p. 791-801.
Leopold, Aldo, "The Land Ethic," in A Sand
County Almanac with Essays on Conservation from Round River (New York:
Ballantine Books, 1966), p.237-264.
Molitor, Ed, Kirk, and Eric, interview by Vicky Foth, April 2, 1988,
Offerle, Kansas.
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