The New York Times
May 27, 2010, Phil Taylor

The rugged Dominguez Canyon Wilderness in southwest Colorado, bereft of roads, transmission lines or even trail markers, is a place of quiet solitude for its human visitors. These days, however, it is difficult to find complete quiet in Dominguez as the sound of rushing water permeates the canyon's sweeping sandstone mesas and red rock formations. Dominguez Canyon's two main creeks -- while reduced to a mere trickle most months of the year -- are flush with water fed by the melting snowpack of the Uncompahgre Plateau west of the 66,000-acre wilderness area. Big Dominguez Creek tears its way through riparian shrubs and over polished schist rocks before tumbling nearly 40 feet into a murky plunge pool. The flow intensifies when the stream joins the Little Dominguez Creek on its way to the Gunnison River, which flows northwest to the Colorado River. For the canyon's native rainbow trout, speckled dace and roundtail chub, the high flows provide essential functions -- the rushing water carries away sediment, providing a habitat of unusually high water quality that attracts abundant insects. For the galleries of cottonwood trees that have taken root near the creek beds, the flooding helps establish bare, moist soil surfaces that the trees depend on to promote seed germination and growth. "We have a super high abundance in diversity in these creek systems because it is a pristine watershed," said Roy Smith, chief water rights coordinator in Utah and Colorado for the Bureau of Land Management, which manages the Dominguez Canyon wilderness. ...

http://www.nytimes.com/gwire/2010/05/27/27greenwire-blm-colo-propose-unique-water-flow-regime-for-53223.html