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Located on the high plains of central Colorado, just 19 miles northeast of downtown Denver, Barr Lake is a warm-water, 33,100 acre-foot reservoir with an excellent fishing and a wildlife refuge. This 100-year old irrigation reservoir owned by the Farmer’s Reservoir and Irrigation Company (FRICO) is becoming an important source of drinking water for the Front Range and now has a new watershed association to help with water quality. The Barr Lake & Milton Reservoir Watershed (BMW) Association is gearing up to improve the water quality by helping the state develop a pH TMDL and nutrient standards. In the early 1900s, FRICO purchased Oasis Reservoir and double its’ size to 1,868 acres and renamed it Barr Lake. Water from Barr is decreed for domestic municipal uses, augmentation, livestock watering, and unrestricted agricultural use. The 37-foot deep reservoir is filled via surface water diverted from the South Platte River at the Burlington headgate (just downstream of Denver) and also from Metro Wastewater Reclamation District effluent which is pumped into the Burlington Canal by the demand of FRICO and their water right agreements with Denver Water. Barr is filled through the winter and is generally topped off during the spring runoff. Releases typically begin in May and continue through the irrigation season until the end of September. The residence time is roughly 260 days. The history of Barr Lake’s water quality has been a rough one. For 50+ years, raw sewage, primary-treated effluent, stockyard waste, and other high-organic runoff filled Barr Lake. The water quality hit an all-time low in the 1950’s when the entire Burlington Canal and Barr Lake became anoxic for months at a time, blanketing the nearby community of Brighton with hydrogen sulfide odors. The regional wastewater treatment facility was upgraded in 1964, and just within 15 years the lake improved so much that it became a state park by 1978. Today, over 300 species of birds have been identified at the park. Last year, 2006 marked the 20th consecutive year for having a successful pair of bald eagles nest on the lake. Barr Lake State Park allows motorboats with 10 horsepower or less. Barr Lake State Park is a day-use only park and does not offer camping or swimming. With the addition of adding domestic drinking water use the lake, water quality improvements are still needed. Barr Lake was listed in 2002 on the state’s 303(d) list of impaired waters for exceedance of the upper pH limit of 9.0. The problem is still the excessive loading of nutrients that then trigger algae blooms. The blooms then increase the pH level above 9.0 for most of the summer months. The BMW Association is a newly formed non profit group that is taking on the task of working on the watershed so that the lake can be de-listed. In the next couple of years, the BMW association will be modeling the watershed and reservoir which will then lead to helping the state develop a pH TMDL and nutrient standards. Through collaborative stakeholder efforts, the BMW Association has developed a Watershed Plan. To read this plan and learn more about Barr Lake, go to www.barr-milton.org.
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