Side-by-side photos show how much Blue Mesa Reservoir’s water levels have risen thanks to this winter’s snow

BLUE MESA RESERVOIR — The images you are seeing here are from a two-year effort to document the historic drawdown of Colorado’s largest body of water, Blue Mesa Reservoir, and its subsequent refill due to a better than-average snowpack this past winter. 

In 2021, at the request of water managers, the Colorado River Drought Contingency Plan was initiated and Blue Mesa Reservoir near Gunnison released 36,000 acre-feet of water, or enough to serve 72,000 households for a year, down the Gunnison River and on to the Colorado River in an effort to bolster water levels at lakes Powell and Mead, during what has been described as the worst drought in 1,200 years in the American West. 

At the time, the shrinking water levels came as a shock to anyone who lived in the Blue Mesa region. Locals scratched their heads, wondering if the new levels would become the new normal for the reservoir. The 2021 drawdown would take water levels at the reservoir to their lowest point since it was first filled in the mid-1960s. 

Conversations on social media turned to worry as thoughts about the availability of water for agriculture, sport fishing, boating and all things water recreation began to feel threatened. 

Throughout the summer of 2021, I scouted locations around the reservoir that illustrated the most dramatic impacts of the draw-down. Keeping in mind that the pictures would be used for future coverage of the reservoir, I documented the time of day, camera settings and focal length to use as a base for future pictures. 

Many around the state, as well as locals, said that since the drought had been dragging on for so many years, the chances of the reservoir refilling were low. 

Keeping hope alive, I kept the pictures in a readily available space in my archive with the chance that they could be used to compare and contrast the reservoir’s revival. In 2022 the reservoir bounced back due to snowpack runoff, but it wasn’t much. And the worry lingered.

But nothing prepared everyone for the great snowfall this past winter that has contributed to the reservoir’s subsequent rebirth.

For example, in 2021 the water level could barely be seen from the Colorado 149 bridge, here locals call it the “Lake City Bridge.” After taking a measurement I was able to determine the water level at that time was in fact over a mile away from the bridge. 

Today, the water level has returned under the bridge and has already reached upstream of the Gunnison River. This truly remarkable turnaround is captured in pictures taken from the bridge in 2021 and on June 6, 2023. 

In other areas of the reservoir, at the Sapinero bridge and the U.S. 50 bridge located about midway through the reservoir, the water levels today dwarf the 2021 levels. 

This year water managers are predicting the level of the Blue Mesa reservoir will come to within a few feet of the reservoir’s maximum capacity — something that has come with a sense of pride for many in the region. 

As the summer begins, anyone driving along Blue Mesa will see an increase in paddle boarders and boaters, fishermen and those out for a picnic. With the fate of water now top of mind for millions in the American West, locals here will definitely be keeping an eye on Big Blue moving forward.