Erich and I want to tell the story of what a vanishing river means for the people and ecosystems that depend on it.
We are traveling by foot and small boat to be as close as possible to the almost 1,900-mile path the river has carved from the Rocky Mountains to the Gulf of Mexico. We want to see the changes first hand and meet the people who live with the river and control its fate.
The Rio Grande has been the lifeblood of the valleys and civilizations it flowed through for more than 3,000 years. As cities and farms suck it dry and a warming climate makes it evaporate faster, the river's future has never been more uncertain. Reporter Colin McDonald and photojournalist Erich Schlegel are traveling the length of the Rio Grande, interviewing those who depend on and control it, taking photos and videos, and cataloging the chemistry and biology of the river from the Rocky Mountains to the Gulf of Mexico.
Their work will be uploaded from the banks of the river via satellite and shared here as they spend seven months on this 1,900-mile journey.
Quemado Day 173
Kay Cunningham is not someone who scares easily.
At 72-years-old, she respects rattlesnakes and gives them a wide berth when she sees them.
“But I don’t run screaming when I do,” she said.
After spending a day in Quemado with our hosts Tony and Catherine Castaneda, it seems there are few here who startle easily.
Retired boxer Joe “the left hook artist” Lopez lives downtown. He is now known as Walking Joe because he slowly strolls the two blocks between the café and general store with a cane. He traveled the country hitting and being hit before deciding to retire where he was born. It’s where he fits in.
Immigrants come through town and the surrounding farms and ranches in groups of 40 or more. Smugglers fleeing from U.S. Border Patrol agents drop bales of marijuana. Wild hogs run rampant in the brush. Escaped alligators show up in the river. Some are as long as 16 feet.
The agents are heavily armed and constantly on the move.
At any moment there is the potential for something tragic to happen.
But it rarely does.
Local political issues include a debate over whether the irrigation district should sell Rio Grande water to oil and gas companies to be used for fracking or for a proposed open pit mine.
Cunningham says no.
“Why sell water for oil and gas when it seems we are getting less rain?” she said. “The district is there for the farmers. That’s how the people who irrigate feel about it.”
Her family has lived in Maverick County since before it was a county. Border Patrol has a security tower on her ranch. She watches smugglers while out birding. Life goes on.
“The alternative is to live in your house with the doors and windows locked,” she said. “I don’t want to live like that. … The world is dangerous, but not that dangerous.”