Water use in Brown County

404 points of diversion — 0.7% of the Kansas file — reporting 5,548 acre-feet in 2023.

404Points

5,5482023, acre-feet

10,603Acres irrigated

90Reporting use

What the series actually shows — Brown County

Reported use here peaked in 2022 at 5,868 acre-feet and bottomed in 1990 at 894. That swing is rainfall, not policy: a wet year needs less pumping than a dry one, and any two years picked from this table can be made to say almost anything.

Comparing decades instead: the last ten years average 4,332 acre-feet a year against 1,185 in the first ten — higher. And the number of points reporting any use moved from 17 to 90: the count of straws in the ground barely changes, whatever the year does to the volume.

Reported use in Brown County, year by year. « Points reporting » counts those returning more than nought — a 0 is not a finding, see below.
Year	Acre-feet	Acres irrigated	Points reporting
1990	894	0	17
1991	1,051	0	18
1992	955	0	18
1993	969	35	19
1994	1,021	35	18
1995	1,311	35	19
1996	1,390	35	14
1997	1,346	35	16
1998	1,407	205	16
1999	1,504	205	17
2000	1,452	175	18
2001	1,236	205	18
2002	1,269	140	17
2003	1,260	55	15
2004	1,244	20	12
2005	1,287	208	18
2006	1,247	208	19
2007	1,311	239	18
2008	1,530	997	22
2009	3,214	1,906	26
2010	5,669	2,497	30
2011	1,991	3,100	39
2012	3,455	3,777	48
2013	3,501	6,039	57
2014	3,646	6,770	60
2015	3,497	7,123	70
2016	4,376	7,820	72
2017	4,975	8,215	74
2018	4,370	7,850	75
2019	3,043	8,475	76
2020	3,638	9,093	75
2021	4,363	9,769	83
2022	5,868	10,584	88
2023	5,548	10,603	90

Where the water comes from

Source	Points	Share
surface water — a river, stream or reservoir	208	51.5%
groundwater — a well	196	48.5%

Which management district

District	Points	Share
Outside any district	404	100.0%

⚠️ What a zero here does not mean

314 of the 404 points in Brown County report 0 acre-feet for 2023, and 399 show five or more successive years at 0 in this file.

A 0 in this file is not a finding. There are no blanks in the usage columns — every point carries a number for every year — so a nil return, a point that did not yet exist, and a report never filed all read the same. Kansas fines non-filing (USD 250 per file, USD 1,000 and suspension after 1 June), which is exactly why a missing report looks like a quiet year.

Kansas does terminate a water right after five successive years without beneficial use — K.S.A. 82a-718 — but only without due and sufficient cause, and only after a hearing before the chief engineer with 30 days’ notice. Four causes are recognised in K.A.R. 5-7-1, including adequate rainfall and water being unavailable at the source, and enrolment in the water rights conservation programme counts as one. A run of zeros here is a reason to check, never a conclusion.

Buying or defending irrigated ground in Brown County?

404 points of diversion sit in Brown County, reporting 5,548 acre-feet in 2023. What a right is actually worth turns on how much it has been used and on whether it can be defended — questions this site cannot answer for a particular file. Tell us where and we pass the request to Kansas water lawyers and consultants.

We recommend nobody and we are nobody's agent. We have no arrangement with any firm today — we are collecting these requests in order to go and find them. What we do with this.

The points, largest first

Brown County, ordered by reported use in 2023. The last column counts the longest run of years at 0 in this file — a fact about the file, not a finding about the right.
Point	County	Source	2023 (AF)	10-yr avg	Acres 2023	Longest run of 0
82000	Brown	surface	457	114	318	26
9490	Brown	surface	374	394	0	5
88456	Brown	surface	285	64	198	31
81999	Brown	surface	259	59	180	28
74826	Brown	ground	230	169	270	18
74261	Brown	surface	214	167	268	18
80965	Brown	surface	166	93	278	23
40329	Brown	ground	161	167	0	0
8349	Brown	ground	137	136	0	4
82146	Brown	surface	113	58	141	25
86769	Brown	surface	108	45	225	31
74352	Brown	ground	105	76	130	18
84856	Brown	surface	100	73	172	26
81383	Brown	surface	98	46	180	24
80801	Brown	surface	94	85	235	23
81730	Brown	surface	91	30	220	30
79865	Brown	ground	80	30	72	23
77075	Brown	surface	76	75	185	20
86234	Brown	ground	75	36	0	27
86235	Brown	ground	73	36	0	27
50	Brown	ground	71	66	0	0
77936	Brown	ground	68	72	100	21
66984	Brown	surface	67	50	165	15
86567	Brown	surface	65	16	105	32
80827	Brown	surface	63	67	249	23
89051	Brown	surface	63	6	60	33
79360	Brown	surface	60	46	135	22
74253	Brown	surface	60	36	85	21
86233	Brown	ground	59	34	0	27
83382	Brown	surface	58	59	235	24
82069	Brown	surface	57	66	422	24
82077	Brown	surface	56	60	320	24
76388	Brown	ground	55	55	135	19
84441	Brown	ground	55	78	265	25
78152	Brown	ground	53	79	360	22
83153	Brown	surface	52	36	205	26
77223	Brown	ground	51	43	183	21
82576	Brown	surface	51	16	159	30
74394	Brown	surface	50	28	196	19
86510	Brown	ground	47	24	59	28
75976	Brown	surface	45	46	31	19
81076	Brown	surface	45	52	126	23
79439	Brown	surface	44	47	290	23
83751	Brown	ground	44	41	55	25
77817	Brown	ground	43	46	190	21
78053	Brown	surface	43	37	210	21
84146	Brown	ground	40	62	130	25
78055	Brown	ground	36	48	160	22
86357	Brown	surface	35	24	210	28
37558	Brown	ground	31	29	0	19
75117	Brown	surface	31	37	103	18
74957	Brown	surface	31	30	87	18
80680	Brown	surface	31	9	28	29
87869	Brown	ground	31	12	100	31
25872	Brown	ground	30	25	0	19
75912	Brown	surface	29	24	37	20
81077	Brown	surface	29	28	76	23
78373	Brown	ground	28	52	280	22
26398	Brown	ground	26	33	0	0
82920	Brown	surface	26	20	104	25
87134	Brown	surface	26	13	18	31
21114	Brown	ground	26	22	0	19
80341	Brown	surface	25	44	83	24
61062	Brown	ground	24	8	0	29
82881	Brown	ground	23	92	270	24
61031	Brown	ground	23	8	0	29
80342	Brown	surface	22	45	75	23
7919	Brown	ground	22	17	0	19
78033	Brown	surface	19	19	100	25
79667	Brown	ground	18	16	231	22
81075	Brown	surface	18	27	133	23
86257	Brown	surface	18	30	197	29
74273	Brown	surface	17	6	31	31
61648	Brown	surface	17	15	9	8
36386	Brown	surface	15	12	60	0
78542	Brown	surface	11	5	37	21
87212	Brown	surface	11	6	65	29
8268	Brown	ground	10	9	0	19
87129	Brown	ground	10	4	105	32
36173	Brown	ground	9	6	0	7
61032	Brown	ground	6	3	0	21
88111	Brown	ground	5	2	100	31
5949	Brown	ground	4	5	0	6
76835	Brown	ground	4	13	12	25
87126	Brown	ground	3	2	29	32
89066	Brown	surface	2	0	202	33
61061	Brown	ground	2	3	0	29
78721	Brown	ground	1	17	110	21
79668	Brown	surface	1	66	9	22
3525	Brown	ground	0	1	0	6
832	Brown	ground	0	0	0	28
846	Brown	ground	0	0	0	21
7648	Brown	ground	0	0	0	34
9088	Brown	ground	0	0	0	34
10236	Brown	ground	0	0	0	34
11863	Brown	ground	0	0	0	5
13651	Brown	ground	0	0	0	34
14295	Brown	ground	0	0	0	32
15823	Brown	ground	0	0	0	20
16232	Brown	ground	0	0	0	23
16804	Brown	ground	0	0	0	27
17540	Brown	surface	0	0	0	34
17771	Brown	ground	0	0	0	33
18205	Brown	ground	0	0	0	34
19414	Brown	ground	0	0	0	28
22607	Brown	ground	0	0	0	19
24566	Brown	surface	0	0	0	34
24777	Brown	ground	0	0	0	34
26935	Brown	ground	0	0	0	34
31960	Brown	surface	0	0	0	34
34325	Brown	ground	0	0	0	34
35361	Brown	ground	0	0	0	34
36482	Brown	ground	0	0	0	34
39540	Brown	ground	0	0	0	21
39789	Brown	surface	0	0	0	34
41980	Brown	ground	0	0	0	30
42285	Brown	ground	0	0	0	34
42448	Brown	ground	0	0	0	30
45805	Brown	ground	0	0	0	34
46718	Brown	ground	0	0	0	10

By source in Brown County

Counties with a comparable file

Saline 543
Hamilton 525
Ellis 500
Butler 472
Dickinson 468
Ottawa 467
Decatur 418
Rawlins 400
Cowley 394
Graham 379
Greeley 367
Marshall 359
Trego 352

Neighbours by the size of their file, not a ranking: the list slides with the county, so each of the 73 county pages is reachable from the others. All of them.