HASTY � When Lance Verhoeff shows you his farming operation, it's a little like stepping through the looking glass.

��� There�s a pond that looks like a hay field.

��� There�s a well that looks like a pond.

��� There�s a seep ditch that looks like a well.

��� Finally, you get to a pair of reservoirs that are a refuge to hundreds of migratory birds � including some very rare ones like a tri-colored heron once spotted there � and learn that one must be drained to satisfy the evaporation loss of the other.

��� �It�s all the same water,� Verhoeff said.

��� Verhoeff, 61, and his wife, Norma, are struggling with state rules that vary among different sources of water. They stand to lose the ability to irrigate about one-third of their 1,750 acres in the Hasty-McClave area as the state cracks down on seep ditches.

��� Seep ditches are water rights claims on tail water from other irrigation systems. State Engineer Dick Wolfe and Division Engineer Steve Witte began administering those rights for the first time about two years ago.

��� Most seep rights owners are upset because they believe the water they have been using for decades never made it back to the Arkansas River, as Wolfe and Witte claim.

���� Verhoeff�s point is that the seep ditches should be treated just like wells under the 1996 rules, because they are using the same alluvial sources as wells, and in many cases have senior rights adjudicated in Water Court. They were also in use before the 1948 Arkansas River Compact with Kansas, so should be given the same preferential treatment as Verhoeff�s open well � the one that looks like a pond.

��� �There�s no physical difference between this and a seep ditch,� Verhoeff said.

��� Verhoeff explains the well intercepts groundwater, just like some seep ditches, but is not charged for evaporation losses as a pond would be because of the conditions of its water decree. It�s the same water that feeds a nearby seep ditch.

��� �It seems only equitable that the state should require various well-user associations to offer pre-compact seep water users memberships at the same terms and conditions that they issued membership to the well users,� Verhoeff said.

��� He also argues that the state should provide some augmentation water, such as water leased by the Division of Wildlife, to the well associations to cover the depletions of seep ditches.

���� Verhoeff�s water supply is a mixed bag of rights.

���� He irrigates with Fort Lyon Canal shares, wells covered by both the Lower Arkansas Water Management Association and Colorado Water Protective and Development Association, the two reservoirs he owns and six private ditches.

��� The use of water has changed over the years, mostly in the amount available at different times of year. For the most part, the changes have improved conditions for irrigating, but there are always trade-offs.

��� After winter water storage began, there were not the year-round flows to fill the pond that now looks like a hay field � but the storage rights remain. The well on the seep ditch was put in to use the water more efficiently. The newest additions to the water system are measuring devices the state requires to keep track of water in the seep ditches.

��� The private ditches are on some of the oldest irrigated land in the Arkansas Valley just east of John Martin Reservoir. The seep rights, however, are junior. Recent administration has required him to return water that once irrigated productive fields to the Arkansas River.

��� The jury�s still out on whether it makes it there because the state is still evaluating the flow. If later this year, like last year, it�s determined the water would not have made it to the river, Verhoeff will have lost the use of the early flows.

��� �It was always a futile call in the past,� Verhoeff said, looking at one of the ditches below John Martin Dam. �This ditch takes the water into about 400 acres of tamarisk.�

���� Meanwhile, several hundreds of acres of fields right next to the ditch look to be ready for corn planting, but won�t be unless there is a good rain soon. The ground�s too dry.

���� Verhoeff said he doesn�t think the state is wrong in enforcing water rights, but wants the field to be leveled for farmers who have come to depend on seep rights.

���� He�s most concerned about the environmental consequences of taking water from places that traditionally have had it. He spent 10 years clearing tamarisk from the irrigation reservoirs he uses, shaping an island in the water and making other improvements to the habitat.

��� Verhoeff is even proposing a conservation easement on the reservoirs to keep up the lakes for birds when he�s gone.

��� �The water level is down,� Verhoeff said as he stood on the earthen dam at the lower reservoir. The upper reservoir can�t be drained, so the state requires him to make up evaporation losses from the lower water body. �I have to keep less water in it to comply with the state regulations.�

���� Verhoeff does not want to quit farming, although state rules are reducing his profit margin. He�s also spending time in court just to protect water he has traditionally used � or as much of it as he can.

���� It�s quite a battle for someone who decided to come back and help his family farm after earning an accounting degree from Colorado State University in 1971. He originally planned to stay at it for just a few years, but over time began acquiring more farms.

���� �It�s an economy of scale,� he said. �I didn�t just wake up one morning and decide to farm all this ground.�

���� Verhoeff resisted the temptation to sell to High Plains, as many of his neighbors did, several years ago because he didn�t think the offer reflected the true value of his ground. Unlike some other seep ditch owners, he has other water rights to fall back on.

���� Most of all, he wants to stay in farming, and just wants a fair shake.

��� �If I was just out to make money, I would have sold my water rights and moved away a long time ago,� Verhoeff said. �It�s a trust. Farmers are stewards and they owe it to their own and future generations. But what we do also benefits all the people of Colorado.�