Getting Water

Getting Water. I’m Greg Martin with today’s Fruit Grower Report.

Eastern Washington is known for being a bit on the dry side and being able to sufficiently irrigate crops is always a concern. Farmers and orchardists now have access to more water rights according to Jani Gilbert with the Department of Ecology.

GILBERT: We have just issued 16 new water right permits for the Quincy Basin totaling about 5,200-acre feet of water and the water is there because we did like a 4 year project to reconcile all the permits in the basin and found that we had not allocated all of the water that’s available.

15 of those permits are for ag use and Gilbert says there are more coming.

GILBERT: This is 52 acre feet today so that leaves us with 25-thousand more acre feet of water to allocate so we’ll be doing that periodically over the next several months.

If you have questions about securing water rights in the Quincy Basin Gilbert says to call their office. The 15 agricultural water rights have been spoken for so you will need to get placed on a list for the next group and she says there is a fee.

GILBERT: In addition to getting a permit from us the water right holder needs to get a license from the Bureau of Reclamation and there’s an associated annual fee for that.

That’s today’s Fruit Grower Report. I’m Greg Martin on the Northwest Ag Information Network.