The Fifth Annual Celebrando las Acequias, held June 14-17 was a great success, as the two-night event, Saturday and Sunday tours were well attended. The event started Thursday evening with a presentation by the Rio Arriba County Planning and Zoning Dept., followed by an eloquent and very informative presentation by New Mexico Acequia Association Executive Director Paula Garcia. She was followed by David Garcia who played his own compositions about the acequias and agriculture, including a "cuando" about chile, as well as singing the Trovo del Café y el Atole.

Friday, Arid Land Institute Co-Director Hadley Arnold provided an overview of the past 3 years of work, followed by a reading by Tierra Amarilla native Dr. Arturo Madrid, from Trinity University, who read from his recently published memoir, In the Country of Empty Crosses. He read from the chapter of his grandfather as the mayordomo, which set the tone for the rest of the conference.

Dr. William Doolittle, from the Geography Department at UT Austin, presented the keynote address, "Our Canal is Indigenous, Yours is....: Whence the Technology Came." Dr. Severin Fowles, a Dixon resident and anthropology professor at Barnard and Columbia University in New York, gave a fascinating talk on his work excavating a Pre-Columbian Pueblo site known as El Bosque on the north side of the Río Embudo across from the old Embudo Plaza, dating back to 1300 AD. Presentations were followed by master folklore musician Cipriano Vigil and his son who performed for the public.

Saturday morning Dr. Thomas Glick from Boston University, who has studied the acequias in Spain for over 50 years, spoke on "Spanish Rights, Lawyers' Wrongs," and made a very interesting comment that "Pueblo Doctrine has no support under Spanish and Mexican Law."

Dr. Manuel Montoya's presentation asserted that acequias should have world heritage status.

 Mayordomos play a legendary role in the acequia, displaying a distinguished knowledge of their acequia and its surrounding community. From the watershed that nurtures the course of the stream eventually reaching the acequia diversion, to the last property served by the acequia, it's often the mayordomo's mental map of his acequia's intricacies that surpass the community knowledge of most others on the acequia. The mayordomo works to ensure equitable water distribution among parciantes, and he makes himself available to address issues that come up throughout the irrigation season, as well as observing the activities of the surrounding environment during the off-season. It's a year-round commitment, often unpaid. Taken together, these attributes implore a great reverence to the mayordomo.

Yet nowadays many acequias have had to address the fact that many of them have aging mayordomos coupled with the lack of younger folks willing step up and fill that vital role for their community. The NMAA has many years of experience working with communities throughout New Mexico, and because the mayordomo has a special place in the acequia, NMAA believed it was vital to contribute resources to address this concern.

NMAA has been working on the  Mayordomo Project since September of 2008. It's is a participatory community-based approach to addressing what the NMAA calls the "Mayordomo Crisis", referring to the decreasing amount of parciantes willing to serve as mayordomo. Through this effort, the NMAA has established a mentorship program that fosters the transmission of local knowledge to the next generation of mayordomos. Additionally, NMAA is developing educational materials to assist in the training process.

The project has evolved through its different stages of development, but has maintained its focus on the mentorship model. In its initial stages, the team interviewed a number of mayordomos in different communities throughout northern New Mexico, gathering valuable insight that guided the development of a mayordomía methodology. For the past couple of years, the project team has followed and documented the trials of Juanita Revak as she shadows her father, Gilbert Sandoval, a longtime mayordomo, to succeed him as the next mayordoma of their acequia.

Using footage gathered in the field, the team developed a short film for educational purposes, The Art of Mayordomía. It's in the final editing stages and will be available for viewing in the coming month. Early next year will mark the completion of a Mayordomo Handbook, which is an in-depth companion guide to the film, illustrating the method of mayordomía that was developed through the information we extracted from the mayordomo interviews.

Future steps include the replication of this model in other communities. We plan to solicit the participation of others who want to share their knowledge and take part in the mentorship process to pass on the tradition of mayordomía in their acequia community.

If you'd like more information about this project please contact Quita Ortiz at (505) 995-9644.

Relief. That's what I felt with the first rain shower this summer. The cracks in the ground got so wide and so deep by the fourth of July; they were almost a tripping hazard. But now that the rains have come, it becomes a mad race on the farm, us versus the weeds. It seems the more you pull, cut & mow, everywhere you turn, there they come again. And now as the heavy rains begin to fall, there is no more cutting and mowing, all you can do is pull. However, you should probably hold off on that until the ground is not sopping wet, otherwise you will pull out all your top soil with the roots and leave a lot of uneven ground behind. Let the ground dry out a bit, pull the weeds when the roots come out cleanly, then you can use the weeds to mulch your plants. We never know how long, before we get rain again, the ground cover will help maintain moisture in the soil.

It is important to control the weeds on your farm so that they do not choke out the plants. They deplete the soil of nutrients and water, competing with the plants you're growing. Also, weeds attract insects such as grasshoppers and leaf-hoppers. We have found that the best way to deter an infestation of bugs is to mow down or pull the weeds around the perimeter of the garden. However, this will do little to help once you do get infested with some sort of pest.

Above: Horn-worms can devastate your tomato plants by stripping them of their vegetation (below).

So how do you identify if you have pests and what can you do to eliminate them? It depends on the pest. There are worms, viruses, grasshoppers, bean beetles, squash bugs and of course moles, rabbits, skunks, deer, bear, and many others. I guess a good fence would work for the rabbit, skunks, deer and bear, but my grandfather used to say that you should plant extra so that the animals could have their share. However, if the critters seem to want more than their share (an elk can have a devastating effect on a garden, as can deer, horses, etc,) a good dog seems to keep most of the critters away, but you have to be a heavy sleeper to get past all the barking at night.

For everything else, let's begin with worms. This past spring as you began to transplant your broccoli or maybe when your chile came out, you may have found your little plants severed in half, and wondered what could cut so cleanly and why would they leave the leaf behind? That is a cut-worm. They are grayish, brown, little fat worms (about an inch long) that you find in the ground. When you disturb the soil to make your bed, they come up and munch on your plant. They curl themselves around the stalk, and eat right through. If you are not an organic producer, the old way was to soak a rag in kerosene and place it at the head water and that would eliminate the cut worm. But, if you are a practicing organic gardener, and you don't have many plants, you could simply put a Popsicle stick next to each little plant as you transplant, or place a sleeve around the plant. You can make a sleeve by cutting the bottom of a Dixie cup and placing the paper ring over the plant, if the cutworm, can't climb up and wrap around the plant, they won't cut it. You might still lose a few this way if they get lucky and come up inside the ring. If you have a large field, this method would be cumbersome. What we do is till, wait a few days, then till again, then transplant, then immediately dust everything with Diatamatious Earth, which are ground up shells that eliminate the cutworm.

Later in the summer there's a chance you'll find horn-worms on your tomato plants. If you hated the cutworms, you'll hate these even more. I have seen one grow close to five inches, it was enormous. I wouldn't recommend trying to kill one, they are leathery and if you try to step on it, they make quite a pop and leave behind a gory, squishy mess. A better option is to gather them up and feed them to the chickens, they love them! You usually find them next to a plant that has been stripped of leaves, and they leave tell tale black droppings the size of a plump grain of rice. Once you find these signs, they should be nearby since they move slowly, but mainly are active at night. If you are squeamish, you might wear gloves to pluck them off the plant. They wrap around your fingers when you pull them off, and their little grippers feel more than a little uncomfortable as they contract around your finger. Be careful not to lose the grains of rice (should there be any) they may carry on their back, these are eggs. For a large infestation use Bacillus thuringiensis kurstaki, commonly referred to as BT. It's an organically safe product that you can find at Johnny's Select Seeds (207-861-3900) or Greenhouse & Garden Supply (505-345-6700).

If you happen to have the unfortunate luck of seeing many of your tomato or chile plants start to dry for no particular reason, you might have the curly top or wilt virus, typically carried by the leaf-hopper that passed through your fields unnoticed. The wilt can be recognized by leaves that tend to curl in, yellow and dry, as if depleted of water. Make sure the plant is getting sufficient water, hasn't been stepped on, the stalk broken by wind, etc, before you pull it. But, if the plant is drying, yellowish in hue and the leaves curl inward, then you probably have the wilt and should pull the plant immediately. Try not to disturb the plant too much, and carefully remove from the field so as not to brush up to or contaminate another plant. Make sure you wash your hands well, before you handle any other plants. By the way, nicotine is toxic to your nightshade plants, tomatoes in particular. Make sure that anyone working in your garden, that may be a smoker, washes their hands before handling your plants.

If you have bean beetles or squash bugs, it may simply be a matter of timing, planting your plants a little earlier or later in the season, or you may not be able to grow them at all in your area during certain months, unless of course you use a good deal of pesticides, but I have very little knowledge of their use. If you wish to grow organically, there are a few things you can do. If you plant squash and start seeing squash bugs, you can place a plank in your garden at night, and in the morning remove all the bugs you find under the plank and eliminate them by feeding them to your chickens. You will then have to go back and remove the eggs from under the leaves, which they will have laid.

The best news of all is that if you did your part and built up your soil with some sort of organic matter such as cover crop, compost or manure, eliminated the weeds and water often to maintain a healthy garden, most insects will not be a bother. I'm sure there is an explanation, but it does seem strange that insects are attracted to plants that are stressed out from thin soils, lack of water or choked out by weeds. I guess it's nature way of saying that if you do your part, she'll meet you the rest of the way.

On June 21st, over 50 participants attended NMAA's last statewide workshop, bringing our monthly acequia governance workshop series to a close. David Garcia opened the workshop with two special canciones about acequias that got the crowd motivated and ready to sink in more knowledge about acequia governance.

NMAA Associate Director Julia Mullen introduced New Mexico Risk Management Division presenters Deputy Director Ed Romero and Attorney Paula Ganz, who talked about Risk Management insurance coverage that the State Risk Management Division makes available to government agencies including acequias. They acknowledge the fact that they don't have a history of providing services to acequias and relevant coverage for acequias is limited in scope. There is an application process that acequia officials must apply for to see if they are eligible. If eligible for coverage and depending on the type, fees are based on the size of the acequia, number of members, risk factors, etc. There is a certificate of coverage that you can see on their website, or you can call them for more information at 505-841-6000.

Questions came up about property damage due to flooding from an acequia. New Mexico Legal Aid attorney David Benavides reminded the group about the Tort Claims Act which protects acequias and their officers from being sued for almost any kind of tort (NMSA § 41-4-13). The only exception is that acequias and their officers/volunteers may be subject to suit for torts arising from the use of a motor vehicle, provided the individual acted lawfully and within the scope of his/her acequia-related duty. For example, a landowner cannot sue the acequia, mayordomo, or commissioners for damage to a fence during a spring cleaning; or for damage resulting from leaving the water running for too long that results in the flooding of someone's property, unless the injury somehow resulted from the negligent use of a motor vehicle.

Questions were asked that merit research including what constitutes an employee. Is the mayordomo an "employee" of the acequia? What about volunteers? NMLA attorney David Benavides and NMAA need to do research on these questions and others and follow up with participants.

Following the Risk Management presentation, experienced Facilitator/Mediator Rosemary Romero presented skills on how to resolve conflict with Alternative Dispute Resolution. There is a new view of conflict resolution based on the mayordomo way of listening, acknowledging that mayordomos have effective listening skills.

Rosemary explained that Alternative Dispute Resolution is a cooperative way of decision making or a third party assistance with negotiations for cooperative problem solving. She taught us that conflict might hold possibilities for mutual growth and could improve the relationship.

Figuring out the right process is key. Sometimes we ask ourselves what really happened and wonder how we got there. You need to figure out a negotiation strategy and if you choose a mediator it must be a neutral party. Rosemary has worked with acequias and can be contacted at (505) 982-9805.

Kenny Salazar, NMAA, spoke of an "amnesty" program that was offered to parciantes on a certain acequia to improve the dues collection. If this is going to work, the membership has to agree to be uniform to deal with everyone equally. In this case they asked all members to pay the past two years and go forward from there. The membership agreed and they had an 85% collection rate in no time. Kenny also talked about the often disputed acequia easement, specifically on laterals. Kenny offered information for acequias in Rio Arriba County who want to record their acequia easement and laterals on the county maps should contact Andrew Martinez at the County.

Mediation vs. the legal process - understanding the underlying issue is important and it is always best to avoid court. David Benavides followed with information about what to do when mediation or negotiation fails and you just can't stay out of court. What are the legal rights and responsibilities of acequias? And when can they seek legal remedy? Commissioners can take parciantes to court for 1) non-payment of dues, 2) interference with ditch (73-2-64 3); and interference with easement (73-2-5). Acequias have authority and are limited to remedies in the state statutes. They can withhold water for non- payment of dues after appropriate legal action. Basically there are four remedies that apply to interference with the easement or access and for illegal use of water or interference: 1) criminal prosecution, 2) Civil prosecution with damages 3) Damages up to $5,000 4) Injunction.

The acequia must choose the remedy that's most effective. If you are a commissioner or mayordomo and need assistance contact David can be contacted at New Mexico Legal Aid at 505-982-9886.

The workshop was closed with a special surprise: NMAA was graced with a gift of lovely painting of an acequia. We held a drawing and the painting was given to a workshop participant. We'd like to thank and acknowledge artist Linda Loleit for donating her work. And congratulations to workshop participant, Pheobe Duvall, for winning the painting. Thanks to everyone for participating in the workshops these past several months, and for sharing your knowledge and experiences with each other at these workshops. It's been a pleasure and we hope to see you all at our other events.

Since December 2011, the NMAA has hosted monthly acequia governance workshops that were video recorded. Those who couldn't attend can now view the valuable information provided in the videos. All of our videos are available to view on our YouTube Channel. 

Above is a video including content from our most recent workshop, Risk Management, Conflict Resolution, and Enforcement.

• Pollinator Habitats;  

• Wetland Restoration & Wetland Restoration (non-floodplain) practice which restores the functions and values of wetland ecosystems that have been devoted to agricultural use and;  

• Habitat Buffers for Upland Birds practice which provides food and cover for quail and upland birds in cropland areas