Rancher solves water problems with old technique

There's no question we have a major water problem in Southern Arizona; We see destructive floods during the monsoons and not enough water during the rest of the year. Tucson News Now went to a ranch deep in the Chiricahua Mountains and saw a man who's using nature to help solve the water problems. 67-year-old Jho Austin has run this ranch with his wife for 31 years. His ranch in the town of Pearce shows a simple, but successful way to bring the land back to life. They use rocks to help control water, and ultimately turn brown areas into green areas. "It's a process that's been used for thousands of years," he said. "The Egyptians made papyrus baskets. The Indians did this. Ancient civilizations have done this for years." The process doesn't have a fancy name nor a big price tag. Rocks are piled in areas where the water runs when it rains, and the loose rock structures slow down the water and allow it to sink in a bit before it moves on. Eventually, areas that were rock or gravel become full of vegetation. Austin showed us a particular part of his ranch, and said the area used to flood a few times a year and then it would dry up. "It had water in it maybe 20 percent of the time, Austin said. "We started putting these loose rock structures in here, and it's gone from being water in it 20 percent of the time to water in it 80 percent of the time." Austin says there are about 20,000 structures on the ranch. Most of the structures are rocks piled on top of each other and some are rocks that are kept stable by wire baskets...more

There's a TV news report at the link provided above.