Elephant Butte Reservoir
   HOME

TheInfoList



OR:

Elephant Butte Reservoir is a
reservoir A reservoir (; from French ''réservoir'' ) is an enlarged lake behind a dam. Such a dam may be either artificial, built to store fresh water or it may be a natural formation. Reservoirs can be created in a number of ways, including contro ...
on the southern part of the
Rio Grande The Rio Grande ( and ), known in Mexico as the Río Bravo del Norte or simply the Río Bravo, is one of the principal rivers (along with the Colorado River) in the southwestern United States and in northern Mexico. The length of the Rio G ...
in the
U.S. state In the United States, a state is a constituent political entity, of which there are 50. Bound together in a political union, each state holds governmental jurisdiction over a separate and defined geographic territory where it shares its sove ...
of
New Mexico ) , population_demonym = New Mexican ( es, Neomexicano, Neomejicano, Nuevo Mexicano) , seat = Santa Fe , LargestCity = Albuquerque , LargestMetro = Tiguex , OfficialLang = None , Languages = English, Spanish ( New Mexican), Navajo, Ker ...
, north of
Truth or Consequences ''Truth or Consequences'' is an American game show originally hosted on NBC radio by Ralph Edwards (1940–1957) and later on television by Edwards (1950–1954), Jack Bailey (1954–1956), Bob Barker (1956–1975), Steve Dunne (1957–1958), ...
. The reservoir is the 84th largest man-made lake in the United States and the largest in New Mexico by total surface area and peak volume. It is the only place in New Mexico that one can find pelicans perched on or alongside the lake. There are also temporary US Coast Guard bases stationed at Elephant Butte. It is impounded by
Elephant Butte Dam Elephant Butte Dam or Elephant Butte Dike, originally Engle Dam, is a concrete gravity dam on the Rio Grande near Truth or Consequences, New Mexico. The dam impounds Elephant Butte Reservoir, which is used mainly for agriculture but also provides ...
and is part of the largest
state park State parks are parks or other protected areas managed at the sub-national level within those nations which use "state" as a political subdivision. State parks are typically established by a state to preserve a location on account of its natural ...
in New Mexico,
Elephant Butte Lake State Park Elephant Butte Lake State Park is a state park of New Mexico, United States, located north of Truth or Consequences along the shore of Elephant Butte Reservoir in Sierra County. Description The park is the largest state park in New Mexico and ...
. The reservoir is part of the
Rio Grande Project The Rio Grande Project is a United States Bureau of Reclamation irrigation, hydroelectricity, flood control, and interbasin water transfer project serving the upper Rio Grande basin in the southwestern United States. The project irrigates along ...
to provide power and irrigation to south-central New Mexico and western
Texas Texas (, ; Spanish language, Spanish: ''Texas'', ''Tejas'') is a state in the South Central United States, South Central region of the United States. At 268,596 square miles (695,662 km2), and with more than 29.1 million residents in 2 ...
. It began to be filled in 1915 and 1916 and at highstand was the largest man-made lake in the world. The reservoir can hold of water from a drainage of 28,900 square miles (74,850 km2). It provides irrigation to 178,000 acres (720 km2) of land.
Fishing Fishing is the activity of trying to catch fish. Fish are often caught as wildlife from the natural environment, but may also be caught from stocked bodies of water such as ponds, canals, park wetlands and reservoirs. Fishing techniques inclu ...
is a popular recreational activity on the reservoir, which contains
striped bass The striped bass (''Morone saxatilis''), also called the Atlantic striped bass, striper, linesider, rock, or rockfish, is an anadromous perciform fish of the family Moronidae found primarily along the Atlantic coast of North America. It has al ...
,
white bass The white bass, silver bass, or sand bass (''Morone chrysops'') is a freshwater fish of the temperate bass family Moronidae. commonly around 12-15 inches long. The species' main color is silver-white to pale green. Its back is dark, with white ...
,
largemouth bass The largemouth bass (''Micropterus salmoides'') is a carnivorous freshwater gamefish in the Centrarchidae ( sunfish) family, a species of black bass native to the eastern and central United States, southeastern Canada and northern Mexico, but ...
,
crappie Crappies () are two species of North American freshwater fish of the genus ''Pomoxis'' in the family Centrarchidae (sunfishes). Both species of crappies are popular game fish among recreational anglers. Etymology The genus name ''Pomoxis'' ...
,
walleye The walleye (''Sander vitreus'', synonym ''Stizostedion vitreum''), also called the yellow pike or yellow pickerel, is a freshwater perciform fish native to most of Canada and to the Northern United States. It is a North American close relat ...
and
catfish Catfish (or catfishes; order Siluriformes or Nematognathi) are a diverse group of ray-finned fish. Named for their prominent barbels, which resemble a cat's whiskers, catfish range in size and behavior from the three largest species alive, ...
.


Etymology

The reservoir, dam, and surrounding area are named after a volcanic core, " Elephant Butte," similarly to
Devils Tower Devils Tower (also known as Bear Lodge Butte) is a butte, possibly laccolithic, composed of igneous rock in the Bear Lodge Ranger District of the Black Hills, near Hulett and Sundance in Crook County, northeastern Wyoming, above the Belle Fo ...
, in
Wyoming Wyoming () is a U.S. state, state in the Mountain states, Mountain West subregion of the Western United States. It is bordered by Montana to the north and northwest, South Dakota and Nebraska to the east, Idaho to the west, Utah to the south ...
. It is now an island in the lake when the water levels are high. The butte was said to have the shape of an
elephant Elephants are the largest existing land animals. Three living species are currently recognised: the African bush elephant, the African forest elephant, and the Asian elephant. They are the only surviving members of the family Elephantidae an ...
lying on its side.


Dam construction and history

The proposed dam featured in the 1906 Boundary Waters Convention between the United States and Mexico, which specified how much water should be delivered to Mexico after the dam's completion. Elephant Butte Dam was constructed between 1911 and 1916, with the reservoir fill starting in 1915. It was a major engineering feat in its day, and the enormous concrete dam is the major feature of the Elephant Butte National Register Historic District. New Mexico State Parks operates a visitor center, which contains information on the construction of the dam. It was the second-largest irrigation dam ever built at the time of its construction and was surpassed only in 1970 by the
Aswan Dam The Aswan Dam, or more specifically since the 1960s, the Aswan High Dam, is one of the world's largest embankment dams, which was built across the Nile in Aswan, Egypt, between 1960 and 1970. Its significance largely eclipsed the previous Aswan L ...
in
Egypt Egypt ( ar, مصر , ), officially the Arab Republic of Egypt, is a transcontinental country spanning the northeast corner of Africa and southwest corner of Asia via a land bridge formed by the Sinai Peninsula. It is bordered by the Mediter ...
, and the reservoir was the largest man-made lake on earth. A large construction community sprang up, which included two worker camps,
railways Rail transport (also known as train transport) is a means of transport that transfers passengers and goods on wheeled vehicles running on rails, which are incorporated in tracks. In contrast to road transport, where the vehicles run on a pre ...
, water tanks, cableway systems, and the former administration building of the
Bureau of Reclamation The Bureau of Reclamation, and formerly the United States Reclamation Service, is a federal agency under the U.S. Department of the Interior, which oversees water resource management, specifically as it applies to the oversight and opera ...
. The "camps" housed American and Mexican workers throughout the dam's construction. One of the former camps ended up under the reservoir itself; the other disappeared altogether. Moreover, many centuries-old communities and farming villages were "obliterated" by the filling of the reservoir and now lie at the bottom, including complete stone structures. Over 2,000 people were displaced by the filling of the reservoir. When the reservoir started filling in 1915, irrigation use downstream was much more limited than today, which allowed the lake to remain relatively full. The lake experienced
highstand A raised shoreline is an ancient shoreline exposed above current water level. These landforms are formed by a relative change in sea level due to global sea level rise, isostatic rebound, and/or tectonic uplift. These surfaces are usually exp ...
for the first time in May 1942. That was the deepest highstand on record and stained the inundated landscape white with gypsum and other minerals and deposited sediments in the surrounding hills. In 1946, new irrigation infrastructure allowed heavy use of the water for farming downstream. By 1950, the "full production" use, coupled with intense drought in the upper basin, had caused the water levels to fall well below the initial 1915 levels. The lowest recorded storage level occurred on August 6, 1954. Another longer-lived highstand occurred in July 1985 and lasted with the spillway in use until 1988. Other highstands occurred in 1994 and 1995. Most of the photographs showing a full lake are from that relatively wet period. Drought has persisted since then, and as of February 2022, water levels have never recovered. The American kidnapper and torturer
David Parker Ray David Parker Ray (November 6, 1939 – May 28, 2002), also known as the Toy-Box Killer, was an American kidnapper, torturer, serial rapist and suspected serial killer. Though no bodies were found, Ray was accused by his accomplices of killing ...
tortured his victims in his "toy box" trailer near the reservoir between 1957 and 1999. He is suspected of killing his victims and disposing of the bodies in the lake, but one survivor he had thought he killed was left near the American-Mexico border. Officials have conducted searches for his victims at the lake but have not found any human remains there or elsewhere that are related to Ray's activities. The former administration building of the Bureau of Reclamation still stands as a
bed and breakfast Bed and breakfast (typically shortened to B&B or BnB) is a small lodging establishment that offers overnight accommodation and breakfast. Bed and breakfasts are often private family homes and typically have between four and eleven rooms, wit ...
facility. Along with other structures of the time, it is listed in the
National Register of Historic Places The National Register of Historic Places (NRHP) is the United States federal government's official list of districts, sites, buildings, structures and objects deemed worthy of preservation for their historical significance or "great artistic v ...
. When the lake falls over 10 meters (30 feet) below maximum capacity, the ruins of the old machine shop and power plant are out of the water. Located near the southeastern shore, the 3000 square-foot concrete structure was once believed to be the remnants of the old field hospital that served the frequently-injured dam construction crew. That building is actually farther upstream in the aptly-named "Hospital Canyon." Plans are underway to make the machine shop ruins a scuba destination in years with a high water level. In 2014, a group celebrating a bachelor party on the exposed sediments of the lake discovered the head and tusks of a 3.2-million-year-old stegomastodon, a relative of actual elephants, in excellent condition. That is one of the most complete finds of a stegomastodon in the area. The skull is on display at the
New Mexico Museum of Natural History and Science The New Mexico Museum of Natural History and Science is a natural history and science museum in Albuquerque, New Mexico near Old Town Albuquerque. The Museum was founded in 1986. It operates as a public revenue facility of the New Mexico Departmen ...
.


Gallery

File:Elephant Butte Reservoir Panorama.jpg, alt=Panoramic view of Elephant Butte Reservoir in 2005, Panoramic view of Elephant Butte Reservoir in 2005 File:Elephant Butte Dam LCCN2008676677.tif, alt=Dam in the foreground and lake with butte in the background, The dam at Elephant Butte Reservoir in 1916, before the 1944 highstand. File:Elephant butte lake 1946.jpg, alt=Elephant Butte Reservoir in 1946, Elephant Butte Reservoir in 1946 after the highstand. Note the mineral stains on the hillsides created just two years prior.


References


External links


Elephant Butte Lake State ParkElephant Butte Chamber of Commerce
* {{Authority control Reservoirs in New Mexico Rio Grande Bodies of water of Sierra County, New Mexico Buildings and structures in Sierra County, New Mexico Historic American Engineering Record in New Mexico Protected areas of Sierra County, New Mexico