Southeastern Colorado Water Conservancy District v. Shelton Farms, Inc.

This is an appeal from two judgments and decrees awarding appellees Shelton Farms and Colorado-New Mexico Land Company (“the Company”) water rights free from the call of any and all senior decreed water rights on the Arkansas River.

This case, so far as we are advised, is of first impression in the United States, dealing with whether the killing of water-using vegetation and the filling of a marshy area to prevent evaporation can produce a superior water right for the amount of water not transpired or evaporated. The Pueblo district court held it could, and granted both Shelton and the Company…