How to Prevent Depletion of Ogallala Aquifer of Kansas Farmers

According to a Kansas State University study the Ogallala Aquifer, a large underground water resource which is located below parts of seven U.S. states in the Midwest. This underground place used to provide fresh water to people and to irrigate their crops in the region could be eventually depleted because of continuing to use the water for the agriculture industry.

Baalman farms land belonging to Baalman has been here for four generations. His father was born in the 1930s, during the infamous Dust Bowl. At that time farmland dried out, dusted up and drove many people away, but what makes the current drought different from the Dust Bowl then that is the Ogallala Aquifer.

So a new project is created, out in the heart of his wheat fields, and industrial pump draws water out of a well tapped into the massive underground aquifer. By this technic, the water reaches and above-ground   “pivot” system will slowly moves in a circular pattern over the planted crops. Baalman say it is a major improvement over the old pipe systems that used to flood the farmland.

He also said that ten years ago he and his local neighbors might have averaged 700-800 gallons per minute wells, but now in 2014 they are probably averaging only 400.

Katherine Wilkins-Wells, a general manger of the Northwest Kansas Groundwater Management District 4 said that it’s an emotional issue, I think, for anyone that works in water and it’s everything to these people and to the people who work in it. Without water, we do not exist.

The five districts work with such farmers including the farmers like Baalman on ways to curb overall water use governed by local boards.

Wilkins-Wells said that there is a technology that they are looking at-where the center pivot will go around the field and will increase its water use or decrease it as it is talking to a computer to a moisture probe that is in the ground, and those moisture probes are telling the sprinklers when they need to be on and when they need to be off to get water to the roots as quick as possible.

It makes the farmer like Baalman and the many others there confident in the future of their farm and thanks to good crop planning and water conservation.

He also hopes that his efforts will ensure the Ogallala Aquifer is a viable water source one his own children can and will- someday depend upon.

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