By Steve Campbell, sfcampbell@star-telegram.com, 817-390-7981
24 July 2011 The ferocious Texas drought is clobbering crops, thinning out cattle herds, decimating wildlife, and drying up streams and reservoirs, but it’s also wreaking havoc deep underground, where the state’s aquifers are dropping at a precipitous rate, experts say. The dip in groundwater levels is forcing many rural homeowners who depend on residential wells to spend $500 to $1,000 to have their pumps lowered or, worse, $7,500 or more to have deeper wells drilled. Lee Weaver knew he was facing a serious problem when he watched his lawn sprinkler dwindle to a meager squirt at his home south of Fort Worth. A half-dozen miles to the west, in a small Aledo-area development, Pete and Stephanie Baldwin were confronting the same sobering reality — the well at their 10-year-old home with a St. Augustine lawn and an inviting pool was barely pumping. “It’s scary. A house without water is a dead house,” said Pete Baldwin, an environmental consultant who acknowledges his family’s small role in a growing problem across Texas, where an estimated 1 million water wells tap rain-starved aquifers. “This drought is making it clear: There are too many straws in a small cup. We’ve created our own problem,” he said while a drilling crew lowered his well 14 feet to the bottom of the 181-foot shaft. […] After nearly a year of scant rainfall, 100 percent of Texas is withering under abnormally dry conditions, according to the latest U.S. Drought Monitor, and 75 percent is in an exceptional drought — the worst level. As a result, the nine major and 21 minor aquifers that supply about 60 percent of the state’s water supply are declining at alarming rates, groundwater officials say. Jack Watts, a veteran water well driller in south Fort Worth, has been getting dozens of calls a week from panicked people whose wells are drying up. “It’s as bad as I’ve ever seen it. It’s good for us, but it’s a real problem for a lot of people,” he said. […] But with Texas suffering through its driest nine months in recorded history, its hottest June ever, a long string of triple-digit temperatures in July and no letup expected in August, the problem is only expected to worsen. “A kind of triple evil” is in play, said Ronald Kaiser, a professor of water law and policy at Texas A&M University. “There are cumulative effects because of the drought,” he said. “Aquifers aren’t recharging as quickly. Because of growth, there is more competition for a dwindling resource. And during a drought, they’re pumping more water.” […] Bob Patterson, president of the Upper Trinity Groundwater Conservation District, which covers Parker, Montague, Wise and Hood counties, said the drought has caused aquifer levels to dip 20 feet in many areas and 50 feet or so in places. The drop has been even deeper in parts of the Blanco-Pedernales Groundwater Conservation District in Central Texas, General Manager Ron Fieseler said. It’s so bad that the district’s namesake rivers, the Blanco and Pedernales, are no longer flowing, he said. “I’ve got one well where we had a 30-foot drop in one week,” he said. The decline in aquifers is happening statewide, said Jim Conkwright, president of the Texas Alliance of Groundwater Districts and general manager of the High Plains Underground Water Conservation District, based in Lubbock. “I think anyone that has a water well is seeing a decline this summer,” he said. Wells are at historic lows in the Lipan-Kickapoo Water Conservation District, which covers three rural counties around San Angelo, General Manager Allan Lange said. “It’s worse than the drought we had in the ’50s. It’s off the charts,” Lange said. Stringent watering restrictions are in place at the Cow Creek Groundwater Conservation District in Kendall County, northwest of San Antonio, General Manager Micah Voulgaris said. “When the cedar trees are dying, you know it’s dry,” he said. “We’ve only had 4.8 inches of rainfall this year. The average since 1893 is 16.7 inches.” […]

Drought is taking toll on Texas aquifers