Water use in Rooks County

284 points of diversion — 0.5% of the Kansas file — reporting 13,681 acre-feet in 2023.

284Points

13,6812023, acre-feet

8,064Acres irrigated

71Reporting use

What the series actually shows — Rooks County

Reported use here peaked in 2000 at 19,836 acre-feet and bottomed in 2008 at 1,538. 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 10,068 acre-feet a year against 12,068 in the first ten — lower. And the number of points reporting any use moved from 86 to 71: the count of straws in the ground barely changes, whatever the year does to the volume.

Reported use in Rooks 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	11,438	1,739	86
1991	7,879	1,863	85
1992	1,873	1,647	77
1993	4,039	807	57
1994	14,029	1,517	75
1995	18,138	1,450	68
1996	15,455	1,702	74
1997	17,249	1,878	71
1998	15,281	2,390	74
1999	15,298	2,251	79
2000	19,836	2,611	85
2001	17,386	2,721	83
2002	18,459	2,549	84
2003	12,156	2,237	84
2004	6,684	2,008	79
2005	2,320	1,880	79
2006	2,576	1,961	81
2007	1,859	2,013	81
2008	1,538	1,553	72
2009	15,939	1,830	71
2010	11,305	10,367	70
2011	12,710	6,558	73
2012	16,540	7,761	77
2013	13,830	7,762	75
2014	2,591	2,370	71
2015	2,495	2,297	73
2016	1,905	2,771	78
2017	13,396	7,425	77
2018	13,044	8,489	73
2019	11,256	8,056	71
2020	12,164	7,910	71
2021	14,273	8,225	74
2022	15,871	8,189	78
2023	13,681	8,064	71

Where the water comes from

Source	Points	Share
groundwater — a well	255	89.8%
surface water — a river, stream or reservoir	29	10.2%

Which management district

District	Points	Share
Outside any district	284	100.0%

⚠️ What a zero here does not mean

213 of the 284 points in Rooks County report 0 acre-feet for 2023, and 247 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 Rooks County?

284 points of diversion sit in Rooks County, reporting 13,681 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

Rooks 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
3533	Rooks	surface	10,818	7,816	5,710	4
51064	Rooks	ground	218	125	120	0
84486	Rooks	ground	197	132	100	25
71589	Rooks	ground	154	62	72	15
11016	Rooks	ground	144	77	130	0
54562	Rooks	ground	121	117	195	5
24573	Rooks	ground	98	74	100	8
14852	Rooks	ground	97	67	110	0
915	Rooks	ground	94	51	80	1
3403	Rooks	ground	85	17	120	31
73035	Rooks	ground	81	52	0	22
39709	Rooks	ground	72	19	90	10
5319	Rooks	ground	71	62	120	3
48354	Rooks	ground	66	55	78	8
23648	Rooks	ground	60	36	110	1
62260	Rooks	ground	60	40	56	9
77644	Rooks	ground	59	55	0	20
33179	Rooks	ground	59	29	0	3
68599	Rooks	ground	56	44	0	15
86732	Rooks	ground	54	25	33	28
77643	Rooks	ground	42	22	0	20
49634	Rooks	ground	41	26	76	15
84655	Rooks	ground	41	30	120	25
44206	Rooks	ground	41	35	0	1
2214	Rooks	ground	40	24	28	6
49145	Rooks	ground	38	25	39	8
63314	Rooks	ground	36	33	33	9
24980	Rooks	ground	35	16	0	1
34677	Rooks	ground	34	35	30	2
9801	Rooks	ground	33	19	0	1
77198	Rooks	ground	31	44	43	23
6757	Rooks	ground	31	28	0	0
72670	Rooks	ground	31	46	0	18
88407	Rooks	ground	30	6	0	32
46636	Rooks	ground	30	32	43	1
26202	Rooks	ground	28	52	0	0
4930	Rooks	ground	27	42	0	0
14670	Rooks	ground	27	22	0	5
44277	Rooks	ground	27	16	0	0
45638	Rooks	ground	26	19	68	14
67907	Rooks	ground	25	9	0	12
79395	Rooks	ground	25	28	0	22
31606	Rooks	ground	25	28	44	8
31140	Rooks	ground	24	21	44	14
16695	Rooks	ground	22	19	0	1
77225	Rooks	ground	22	25	0	20
13743	Rooks	ground	20	15	20	2
27953	Rooks	ground	19	25	0	0
70012	Rooks	ground	18	16	0	14
3342	Rooks	ground	18	6	0	3
7839	Rooks	ground	17	10	103	12
23511	Rooks	ground	16	15	35	14
46057	Rooks	ground	15	14	22	1
20633	Rooks	ground	12	4	12	31
40745	Rooks	ground	9	12	36	4
15665	Rooks	ground	8	12	0	2
64992	Rooks	ground	8	4	0	10
83452	Rooks	ground	7	2	0	25
13509	Rooks	ground	7	17	0	0
25754	Rooks	ground	5	7	0	7
85876	Rooks	ground	4	3	2	27
45656	Rooks	ground	3	13	0	20
42457	Rooks	ground	3	7	0	0
1704	Rooks	ground	3	3	0	2
26070	Rooks	ground	3	22	17	12
53267	Rooks	ground	3	0	0	13
66888	Rooks	ground	3	2	0	12
2444	Rooks	ground	1	0	13	9
73514	Rooks	ground	0	0	2	17
13302	Rooks	ground	0	1	0	0
84842	Rooks	ground	0	0	0	26
791	Rooks	ground	0	2	0	15
1576	Rooks	surface	0	0	0	29
1928	Rooks	surface	0	0	0	34
2077	Rooks	ground	0	0	0	29
2213	Rooks	surface	0	0	0	34
2431	Rooks	ground	0	0	0	27
3259	Rooks	ground	0	0	0	34
3940	Rooks	ground	0	0	0	34
4616	Rooks	surface	0	0	0	34
5846	Rooks	ground	0	0	0	13
6101	Rooks	ground	0	0	0	34
6206	Rooks	ground	0	0	0	23
7406	Rooks	ground	0	0	0	19
7744	Rooks	ground	0	0	0	32
8725	Rooks	surface	0	0	0	34
9691	Rooks	ground	0	0	0	26
10262	Rooks	ground	0	0	0	34
10386	Rooks	ground	0	0	0	23
10740	Rooks	ground	0	0	0	34
10983	Rooks	ground	0	0	0	34
12083	Rooks	ground	0	1	0	10
12358	Rooks	ground	0	0	0	34
12676	Rooks	ground	0	0	0	34
12785	Rooks	ground	0	0	0	24
12794	Rooks	ground	0	5	0	4
13130	Rooks	ground	0	0	0	34
14301	Rooks	ground	0	0	0	34
14441	Rooks	ground	0	0	0	12
14885	Rooks	ground	0	0	0	34
15209	Rooks	ground	0	0	0	34
15497	Rooks	ground	0	1	0	9
15509	Rooks	ground	0	0	0	34
15625	Rooks	ground	0	0	0	23
15648	Rooks	ground	0	3	0	2
15815	Rooks	ground	0	0	0	28
15952	Rooks	ground	0	0	0	34
16020	Rooks	surface	0	0	0	34
16325	Rooks	ground	0	0	0	32
16591	Rooks	ground	0	0	0	23
17018	Rooks	ground	0	0	0	29
17280	Rooks	ground	0	0	0	17
17474	Rooks	ground	0	0	0	34
17589	Rooks	ground	0	0	0	34
18606	Rooks	ground	0	0	0	11
19173	Rooks	ground	0	0	0	14
19305	Rooks	ground	0	0	0	34
19630	Rooks	ground	0	3	0	5
20167	Rooks	ground	0	0	0	28
21126	Rooks	surface	0	0	0	29

Counties with a comparable file

Osborne 311
Douglas 310
Marion 298
Johnson 297
Smith 293
Jefferson 290
Barber 289
Mitchell 274
Ness 274
Geary 261
Nemaha 247
Jewell 222
Wyandotte 212

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.