Obviously, pumping from the river in Martindale does not affect the springflow from the San Marcos Springs. It does, however affect the streamflow in the San Marcos River downstream of the diversion point and it does affect the instream flows into the San Antonio Bay.

Our point is that we are telling the folks in San Antonio to conserve water (by turning off the water while they brush their teeth and by letting their lawns die) so the San Marcos Springs can continue to flow. Obviously, the San Marcos Springs are dramatically affected by what happens to the aquifer upstream of San Marcos. And, one of the reasons that we ask San Antonians to conserve water is to save the Whooping Cranes (who depend on those instream flows into San Antonio Bay). But, what the state is doing is allowing all this water that has been conserved to be used to fill private lakes so rich folks can waterski.

But the diversion of water downstream of the San Marcos Springs does not affect those springs.

Hope this helps.

Tom Goynes

Ignorant though I may be about the way such things work, it would seem to me that nothing that happens downstream would affect the amount of water that the springs generate at the head of the river. I would think that downstream pumping would only affect those further downstream.

Are you telling me that the springs somehow ’sense’ low water miles downstream and pump harder to compensate? That seems to be a tough concept for me to wrap my head around.