Water use in Shawnee County

601 points of diversion — 1.0% of the Kansas file — reporting 40,862 acre-feet in 2023.

601Points

40,8622023, acre-feet

17,834Acres irrigated

255Reporting use

What the series actually shows — Shawnee County

Reported use here peaked in 1991 at 52,782 acre-feet and bottomed in 2015 at 24,379. 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 36,722 acre-feet a year against 47,006 in the first ten — lower. And the number of points reporting any use moved from 219 to 255: the count of straws in the ground barely changes, whatever the year does to the volume.

Reported use in Shawnee 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	49,424	13,724	219
1991	52,782	14,714	230
1992	40,431	12,715	200
1993	35,387	2,133	58
1994	47,171	14,688	228
1995	46,707	14,466	229
1996	48,257	15,523	237
1997	48,882	15,775	246
1998	48,881	14,800	231
1999	52,142	15,335	244
2000	51,634	15,394	243
2001	46,976	15,399	238
2002	51,668	15,323	247
2003	52,194	15,560	249
2004	39,392	9,843	162
2005	43,202	16,074	243
2006	47,430	16,554	247
2007	45,356	16,625	249
2008	41,281	15,875	232
2009	36,999	9,287	148
2010	42,025	15,857	241
2011	45,854	16,740	262
2012	50,762	17,143	263
2013	41,066	17,515	259
2014	40,745	17,492	263
2015	24,379	10,682	174
2016	34,882	16,739	256
2017	34,241	17,454	259
2018	41,384	17,488	265
2019	35,157	13,906	223
2020	36,507	17,067	245
2021	40,764	17,110	256
2022	38,300	17,144	249
2023	40,862	17,834	255

Where the water comes from

Source	Points	Share
groundwater — a well	474	78.9%
surface water — a river, stream or reservoir	127	21.1%

Which management district

District	Points	Share
Outside any district	601	100.0%

⚠️ What a zero here does not mean

346 of the 601 points in Shawnee County report 0 acre-feet for 2023, and 469 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 Shawnee County?

601 points of diversion sit in Shawnee County, reporting 40,862 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

Shawnee 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
5781	Shawnee	surface	14,842	11,871	0	0
41143	Shawnee	surface	11,966	11,190	0	1
72742	Shawnee	ground	2,171	622	0	27
39746	Shawnee	ground	777	669	0	1
36809	Shawnee	ground	586	254	0	0
65618	Shawnee	ground	300	262	0	12
12207	Shawnee	ground	244	303	0	0
84923	Shawnee	ground	243	99	0	28
28636	Shawnee	ground	233	237	0	2
40915	Shawnee	ground	222	215	0	1
73271	Shawnee	ground	185	138	0	20
73269	Shawnee	ground	178	114	0	20
76202	Shawnee	ground	157	137	0	19
73267	Shawnee	ground	157	119	0	20
73273	Shawnee	ground	155	146	0	20
73268	Shawnee	ground	150	127	0	20
73266	Shawnee	ground	145	136	0	20
84921	Shawnee	ground	143	90	0	28
43925	Shawnee	surface	135	102	69	0
43448	Shawnee	ground	132	49	135	1
79387	Shawnee	ground	122	95	0	24
72117	Shawnee	ground	114	29	234	16
81886	Shawnee	ground	104	77	132	23
72399	Shawnee	ground	100	84	0	24
73341	Shawnee	ground	100	79	105	17
11714	Shawnee	ground	100	57	135	2
79938	Shawnee	ground	95	56	78	22
86041	Shawnee	surface	92	75	0	29
37416	Shawnee	ground	92	67	95	1
83718	Shawnee	ground	92	55	154	24
17282	Shawnee	ground	91	94	0	8
67326	Shawnee	ground	83	39	107	12
43742	Shawnee	ground	79	35	139	5
82453	Shawnee	ground	77	65	195	23
79913	Shawnee	surface	77	66	38	23
2671	Shawnee	ground	72	56	133	1
8252	Shawnee	ground	69	43	123	2
29655	Shawnee	ground	66	41	93	2
50960	Shawnee	ground	66	58	116	4
68454	Shawnee	ground	65	48	110	13
89551	Shawnee	ground	65	6	80	33
68995	Shawnee	surface	65	80	406	16
73270	Shawnee	ground	65	75	0	20
42178	Shawnee	ground	64	41	135	1
30568	Shawnee	ground	62	40	155	1
43022	Shawnee	ground	61	47	132	2
52852	Shawnee	ground	61	48	115	0
42148	Shawnee	ground	58	40	93	1
36575	Shawnee	ground	58	30	160	1
20865	Shawnee	ground	58	47	124	1
26716	Shawnee	ground	58	31	113	1
87177	Shawnee	ground	57	23	116	29
2819	Shawnee	ground	57	58	0	0
28123	Shawnee	ground	55	36	72	1
28055	Shawnee	ground	55	33	120	0
69800	Shawnee	ground	55	38	139	14
16000	Shawnee	ground	54	37	150	1
72400	Shawnee	ground	53	73	0	24
69723	Shawnee	ground	53	38	135	16
71324	Shawnee	ground	52	29	70	16
29216	Shawnee	ground	52	47	70	1
33458	Shawnee	ground	51	34	82	1
29318	Shawnee	ground	51	16	120	3
78026	Shawnee	ground	51	31	132	20
19093	Shawnee	ground	51	35	160	1
22398	Shawnee	ground	50	26	78	1
9243	Shawnee	ground	50	53	103	1
2678	Shawnee	ground	50	43	136	3
38156	Shawnee	ground	50	38	100	1
16911	Shawnee	ground	50	35	63	1
6153	Shawnee	ground	49	33	155	1
28586	Shawnee	ground	47	34	68	2
15382	Shawnee	ground	47	39	150	1
43736	Shawnee	ground	46	38	125	1
46499	Shawnee	ground	45	38	121	2
69745	Shawnee	ground	45	26	60	13
19143	Shawnee	ground	44	46	159	1
79886	Shawnee	ground	44	36	75	25
54492	Shawnee	ground	44	24	75	1
49620	Shawnee	ground	44	29	120	1
10518	Shawnee	ground	44	42	103	5
75761	Shawnee	ground	44	37	119	19
38230	Shawnee	ground	44	23	80	1
33291	Shawnee	ground	43	31	105	4
50778	Shawnee	ground	42	31	95	1
71883	Shawnee	ground	42	28	47	15
80298	Shawnee	ground	42	36	118	22
12868	Shawnee	ground	41	37	140	1
63401	Shawnee	ground	41	33	132	9
21108	Shawnee	ground	40	30	66	2
33755	Shawnee	ground	40	34	75	1
66603	Shawnee	ground	40	32	64	11
35145	Shawnee	ground	40	24	137	1
87297	Shawnee	surface	39	19	144	31
36798	Shawnee	ground	39	44	0	0
69694	Shawnee	ground	38	34	158	13
79446	Shawnee	ground	38	28	67	22
79351	Shawnee	ground	38	35	0	24
64442	Shawnee	ground	38	27	13	11
68662	Shawnee	ground	37	25	120	14
54480	Shawnee	ground	37	272	0	0
61722	Shawnee	ground	37	28	73	8
76316	Shawnee	ground	36	24	145	25
28489	Shawnee	ground	36	25	93	17
33985	Shawnee	ground	36	32	78	1
79447	Shawnee	ground	36	14	125	22
38776	Shawnee	ground	35	32	67	1
54872	Shawnee	ground	35	33	94	1
80467	Shawnee	ground	35	35	100	23
40169	Shawnee	ground	34	19	98	2
45084	Shawnee	ground	34	23	67	1
61897	Shawnee	ground	34	21	80	10
22959	Shawnee	ground	34	26	54	3
36399	Shawnee	ground	34	22	120	2
67788	Shawnee	ground	34	23	75	14
19159	Shawnee	ground	34	20	65	1
81253	Shawnee	ground	33	19	77	24
1420	Shawnee	ground	33	25	67	1
85830	Shawnee	ground	33	23	71	27
81340	Shawnee	ground	32	22	68	24

Counties with a comparable file

Cheyenne 676
Washington 663
Clay 654
Phillips 637
Pottawatomie 636
Wallace 621
Morton 601
Kingman 599
Rush 558
Gove 554
Kiowa 554
Saline 543
Hamilton 525

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.