Ground water atlas of the United States: Segment 2, Arizona, Colorado, New Mexico, Utah

The Rio Grande aquifer system is the principal aquifer in a 70,000-square-mile area of southern Colorado, central New Mexico, and western Texas. The aquifer system consists of a network of hydraulically interconnected aquifers in basin-fill deposits located along the Rio Grande Valley and nearby valleys. The aquifer system corresponds to the eastern part of the Southwest alluvial basins aquifer system, as defined by U.S. Geological Survey Regional Aquifer-System Analysis studies, and is located in the Southern Rocky Mountains and Basin and Range Physiographic Provinces. The part of the aquifer system in Colorado and New Mexico is described in this report; the part in Texas is described in Chapter E of this Atlas. The basin-fill aquifers of the Rio Grande aquifer system are present in intermountain basins between discontinuous mountain ranges in southern New Mexico and between mountains and tablelands in northern New Mexico. High mountains border the aquifers in southern Colorado. Th