OT-OK Panhandle area

[keh]

For someone in the OK Panhandle area. A few years ago, one of the TV news programs had an article on, I think, on Optima Lake near Hardesty, OK. It seems some years previously there had been unusual rainfall and some areas had flooded. So the government had grabbed land and built a flood control lake, maybe even to provide water for irrigation also. Anyway, at the time the report was aired, normal rainfall had not filled the lake to the dissapointment of the real estate people who hoped to sell lake front lots, etc and to others who thought the lake would be such a benefit. My question is, did this years rains fill up the lake? Has it ever been full?

KEH

 

[Howard H.]

It has never filled up to the extent they originally planned. I haven't been over there in quite a while, but you had to drive about 3/4 of a mile to a mile from one of the boat docks to the water front at that time.

It got so low I heard you could walk across it in the middle, but think it HAS gotten more water recently.

Never really heard the part of people wanting to make money on lake front property - it was the opposite that I always heard - the ranchers that were forced to give up their land for it always wanted it back.

I know a few years ago when it never filled, someone (the landowners, I think) got it placed on the election to "de-claim" some of the land as state property and let the original owners re-purchase it. Even without water, that election went down something like 90% against that idea.

It DOES make a nice state park and hunting area even being low on water.

A lot of people out here think pumping the Ogallala acquifer down with so much irrigation has really changed things from the way they were years ago (when a dam at that location really COULD have probably filled up a nice lake).

Lake Etling out west of Optima in Cimarron county ran completely dry a year or so ago.

Still - out in this area - all it would take is one of the real gully-washers that comes up every so often and dumps 8-15 inches at one time to completely fill it in one swoop.

Howard

 

[keh]

Thanks, Howard. I may have been mistaken about the lake front property sales, it's been a few years since I saw the program.

KEH

 

[Ken 46]

Good Afternoon - went down toward Hardesty on Friday - On the highway and of course could NOT see Optima Lake - but everything else around there is DRY. Here in the edge of Kansas we seem to be somewhat wet- I see ponds where I haven't seen ponds in my 15 years here.
Some wheat lodged - but is GOOD overall!!!!!!!!
I have not been to the Lake in several years- but as dry as we have been it would take a lot of rain.
The Arkansas river is runnoing at Syracuse, Daughter and grandkids have been tanking recently- but at Garden City it is DRY- only motorcyle and 4 whellers trails
Ken

 

[Anonymous-0]

Cool google hit from '05...talk about a ghost dam...
http://www.miriameaglemon.com/trip%20reports/Oklahoma/Optima%20NWR.htm

 

[Howard H.]

Hey KEH - they probably would put something (slightly controversial) in a news story just to spice it up... Anyone who has been at a newstory firsthand and then sees or reads about it later and sees how garbled the story can be portrayed knows how that goes!!

Yes, that is an interesting article about the bird watcher...

It IS easy to make fun of building a dam there and not seeing it fill up - not exactly sure how that happened, but if I was guessing, the state folks looked at the map and thought that would be a good location based on the huge drainage basin and the distance to any other state park lakes around... It DOES make sense from that angle.

But for the average cross-country bird watcher to come out here and laugh about us being low on water is a little like laughing at a blind person for not being able to see!! No one wants it to be that way! They'd do anything to be able to change the situation!

No one appreciates ample water supplies more than persons who live without them in such an arid area as ours. I guarantee you there has been a WORLD of misery experienced by farmers and ranchers over the years out here in watching crops burn completely up and grass wither away to nothing when the rains didn't come...

I was visiting with an 85 year old neighbor one time - one of the finest cattleman to ever live - and we were talking about a cloud building in the west - and I casually said "oh, no big deal if this cloud misses us, we're bound to get a rain soon..."... and he sort of drifted off and mumbled "... one time it didn't rain...". And he got such a cold distant stare and almost went into a trance for a minute or two - it was almost spooky - I was overwhelmed by the raw emotion and pain still present from years long ago. I felt bad for being so cavalier when I know a lot of these old timers sure saw some very hard times...

I wish there was some way to bottle up some of the flooding in other parts of the country and dump it right into that lake!


Howard