As the dry season approaches, the ongoing stage three drought in San Marcos could worsen.
The city of San Marcos has been under stage three drought restrictions for over a year, limiting residential water use. San Marcos is approaching dry season after experiencing an already dry October, according to the deputy director of the Spring Lake Education Program, Miranda Wait.
According to Wait, although the San Marcos River is currently at stage three drought restrictions, the San Antonio Pool, part of the Edwards Aquifer, is in a stage four drought.
“[October] is supposed to be one of the wettest months. That’s kind of scary thinking, considering that, just looking at the current flow for the aquifer here in San Marcos, it’s at 88 and we’re in stage four drought … We should be above 100 at the minimum, closer to 200 for it to be normal or healthy flow,” Wait said.
With the Edwards Aquifer at stage four, Wait said less water is being pushed out of Spring Lake, causing the water in the river to be lower and the flow to be weaker.
“How long are we going to have water in Spring Lake and still be able to do glass-bottom boats?” Wait said. “So that’s a real question that I and my team have to talk about and think about… There is not as much water in the aquifer as promised to people.”
Wait said she has never seen the water level this low for this long, and that 10 years ago, Spring Lake was a foot higher. Wait stated that “it’s definitely going to be in our lifetime where we start having major issues around freshwater.”
Jason Julian, geography and environmental studies professor, wrote in an email to The Star that the flow in the river doesn’t just depend on rainfall, but the contributions from two different aquifers: Edwards and Trinity.
The Edwards and Trinity aquifers are interconnected through faults, which allows for water to flow between them; however, each has their own separate systems and recharge zones according to the Edwards Aquifer website.
Both aquifers feed into the San Marcos River, with the Edwards being the primary source and Trinity contributing to the river’s tributaries, or smaller streams that flow into a larger river, like the Blanco River.
“If we continue to pump the Trinity Aquifer at unsustainable rates, we will see even further reductions in the flow of surrounding springs and the San Marcos River,” Julian said.
Julian wrote that Texas is in a megadrought that started around the turn of the century, with the annual average precipitation decreasing since.
“In the past 20 years, we have seen droughts become more frequent, more intense, and last longer. If scientists are right, our current drought will not only persist but get worse,” Julian wrote. “It’s going to be a long time, maybe not even in our lifetimes, until we see rainfall like we had in the 1980s and 1990s.”
Julian wrote that with the growing population in San Marcos, more people are depending on the river for various social demands.
“The increased building can also impact water quality, as well as flooding,” Julian wrote. “Development along Purgatory Creek, Willow Creek, and Sessom Creek, the major tributaries to the San Marcos River within the city, has affected water quality and flooding.”
Adriana Montoya, a geography master, said it’s concerning to see threats to the river when Texas State University has much of its research, culture and educational outputs.
“The relationship between humans and water is really one of exploitation, I would say. Both, like physically on an infrastructure level, but then also legally, there aren’t a whole lot of legal checks on how much water can be regulated and conserved and protected,” Montoya said.
San Marcos is battling the drought through water restrictions and partnering with water treatment plants like the Carrizo Water Treatment Plant and the Canyon Regional Water Authority to receive water in return for funding.
