Primera Agua: The Acequias in a Dry Year

Each spring in Albuquerque’s South Valley, the community gathers at the headwaters of the Atrisco Acequia Madre for Primera Agua, a blessing of the season’s first water: flower petals tossed into the ditch, dances, songs and prayers, hosted by the Center for Social Sustainable Systems. This year the celebration carried a harder undertone. New Mexico’s snowpack sank to roughly a fifth of normal by late April, and the river began drying months early.

New Mexico has more than 700 active acequias, community-governed irrigation ditches that predate statehood by centuries. Their stewards lean on old sharing practices in dry years. In January, a House committee advanced a bill to give acequias a dedicated funding stream, after the New Mexico Acequia Association told lawmakers acequias statewide carry some $73 million in unmet needs. The acequia may be the oldest living model of regenerative community along this river.

Sources: New Mexico’s time-honored irrigation canals face existential threat (Inside Climate News via Source NM) · NM committee OKs bill giving acequias dedicated funding stream (Source NM)