The Wright-Ingraham Institute

10/07/2026

Adaptation is as much an institutional challenge as it is an ecological one.

Wildfires don’t care who owns a forest. But coordinating work across private landowners, federal agencies, and local jurisdictions means navigating different mandates, incentives, and ideas about what should happen next. How do we prepare people to do that work?

In our latest Substack post, our Executive Director, Tal Beery, explores this question through a conversation with Colorado farmer and Agricultural Water Policy Advisor Robert Sakata, reflects on lessons from this summer’s Field Workshop in the Upper Rio Grande, and considers how these questions are shaping our 2027 Field Workshop, Building a Shared Future in a Time of Rapid Change.

Link to our Substack in bio

09/07/2026

This month we are excited to hand the Substack over to Frank Miller, who sits on our board and co-directs our StudyTank research project with Catherine Ingraham. He owns farmland in Southern California where he is currently involved in water rights negotiations with local Native American tribes. Frank has lived in Colorado, Arizona, New Mexico and California (plus Massachusetts), and has many years of experience with water issues across the West.

Frank’s essay reflects on the structure of water rights in the basin and how they impact the behavior of people making water use decisions. Following 25 years of decreasing snowpack in the mountains and increasing temperatures in the Colorado River Basin, the common view is that we are transitioning from drought into a period of aridification – a more permanent regional dry-up. Consumption of Colorado River water has exceeded available flow for decades, made possible by the cushion of water in Lake Powell and Lake Mead, which is now nearly depleted. Frank explores two important concepts to shed light on rules and behavior: the first is the “tragedy of the commons” scenario, and the second is the problem of making decisions under conditions of deep uncertainty.

These concepts are central to the work we do at the Institute. In the Rio Grande and Colorado River watersheds and beyond, versions of the same question keep surfacing: How can we make better decisions regarding diminishing natural resources in the context of unknown future availability and increasing demand?

Link in bio

08/10/2026

Over the past month, our 2026 Field Workshop fellows have been working across the San Luis Valley, following water from the forested high country to irrigated fields and down to the head gate.

Along the way, they’ve been learning from farmers, ranchers, conservationists, acequia leaders, ditch riders, land trusts, and others who have been navigating the Valley’s changing conditions for generations.

Our report back from the field is live on Integrative Futures, including a preview of what the fellows will present at our upcoming webinar on September 16.

Read it at the link in bio, and RSVP to join us live!

07/25/2026

As our 2026 Field Workshop fellows prepare for Saturday’s symposium, we’re sharing a preview of each synthesis team’s work with community partners across a distinct geography.

The Conejos Team’s framing question: What does water governance look like when you follow it down to the head gate?

Kethry Soares, Moneer Ba-Ahmad, Xiaodong Yan, and Ximena Diaz Velasco spent three days with Angie Mestas (CSU Extension and Conejos County Conservation District), meeting with local mayordomos along ditches off the Conejos River and Daniel Boyes of the Rio Grande Headwaters Restoration Project. They explored ditch maintenance, organizational dynamics, and the politics that come with both while visiting numerous acequias throughout the watershed, gaining hands-on experience with some of the day-to-day work of a mayordomo. Conversations also touched on beaver dams, varas, soil health, and ranching practices.

Drawing on three weeks of learning across the San Luis Valley, the group explores the complex relationships between water, land, agriculture, and community. Through conversations with ranchers, farmers, acequia leaders, conservationists, and local residents, they examine how water governance and ditch-related practices are experienced not only as a technical or legal system, but also as a social and cultural tradition rooted in generations of place-based knowledge.

Rather than prescribing definitive solutions, their project seeks to surface diverse perspectives, illuminate shared challenges, and contribute to the ongoing dialogue about the future of water, working lands, and community life in the San Luis Valley.

Come hear their presentation.

Designing for Adaptation: A Symposium
Saturday, July 25, 2026 | 1:30–6:00 p.m.
Reception to follow.
Adams State University, Alamosa, Colorado

07/25/2026

As our 2026 Field Workshop fellows prepare for Saturday’s symposium, we’re sharing a preview of each synthesis team’s work with community partners across a distinct geography.

The Center Team’s framing question: How can aquifer-dependent agricultural communities adapt to and thrive in an arid future?

Angie Kaufman, Cameron Blakely, Leah Coe, and Noah Silber-Coats spent three days with Madeline Wilson (Mosca-Hooper Conservation District and Secana CO), visiting a revegetation monitoring plot, a historic mineral well in Del Norte, and La Garita Creek. They met with representatives from Land and Carbon to learn about a local carbon credit project and spent an afternoon with the Bartee family near Center discussing the agricultural innovations they are investing in for the future of their farm. The team also visited Penitente Canyon, Joyful Journey Hot Springs, and the Garner Trailhead, observing how tourism moves through the Valley.

Their work focused on one of the Valley’s defining challenges. Colorado’s San Luis Valley is one of the most heavily irrigated and drought-impacted regions of the state. Production within the Rio Grande Water Conservation District’s Subdistrict 1 supports much of the Valley’s $495.2 million agricultural economy. Yet despite improving irrigation efficiency, the aquifer continues to decline. Stabilizing it will require retiring an estimated 40,000–65,000 acres of farmland.

Using the center pivot as a space to experiment with alternative land uses, their project explores what it means to adapt to and thrive in an arid future.

Come hear their presentation.

Designing for Adaptation: A Symposium
Saturday, July 25, 2026 | 1:30–6:00 p.m.
Adams State University, Alamosa, Colorado

07/24/2026

As our 2026 Field Workshop fellows prepare for the program’s culminating symposium, we asked each of our synthesis teams, working within a specific geography with community partners, to reflect on what they were learning and to share a teaser of what they will be presenting in Alamosa. 

The framing question for the Headwaters team was: how can land and forest stewardship practices be implemented at the scale needed to reduce wildfire risk and protect water systems while remaining viable for working farms and ranches?

Audrey Snyder, Euwan Kim, Kelsey Romero and Stephanie McMorran spent three days with Jocelyn Catterson at RiGHT and Adam Moore at Colorado Forest Service, looking at how, crucially, healthy forests and healthy water are dependent on each other. Forest health is paramount to water conservation efforts in the region, but people don’t always see the connection.

”We kept hearing how hard it is for six rural counties to get their forest and wildfire priorities recognized at the state level, even with 1.8 million acres of the Rio Grande National Forest ringing the Valley and years of beetle kill and other damaging bugs threatening forest health. We visited 4UR Ranch and Humphreys, watching land trusts, the Forest Service, and private landowners try to treat forests across property lines. We also visited treatment sites up and down the river near Monte Vista, where funding itself often gets in the way: grant requirements carve the work into pieces that stop at the boundary of a parcel.”

Their project asks how to make that truth legible to the people whose groundwater depends on their involvement in its conservation, and how to get the region’s voices and stakeholders into the rooms where decisions about the future of water and forests are made.

Come hear what they found!

Designing for Adaptation: A Symposium
When: Saturday, July 25, 2026, 1:30 pm - 6:00 pm with reception to follow.
Where: Adams State University, Alamosa, CO

07/21/2026

More updates from our Field Workshop!

After the days in Crestone, the fellows spent the next phase meeting with partners, researchers, and community members throughout the valley, to better understand the interconnected systems shaping the region.

This began with water and land governance at the Rio Grande Water Conservation District with Amber Pacheco and Bill Brinton, followed by David Robbins introducing Colorado and regional water rights. Catherine Ingraham and Frank Miller also shared the Wright-Ingraham Institute’s legacy and agency of inquiry.

We then kayaked the Rio Grande before exploring watershed thinking and forest health with Jocelyn Catterson and Adam Moore at the Rio Grande Headwaters Land Trust. Fellows learned how land conservation, watershed management, and upstream land use impact downstream communities.

Madeline Wilson introduced agriculture and agricultural markets in the San Luis Valley, while agronomist Patrick O’Neill and a visit to the Nissen Farm grounded our understanding of soil as the system connecting ecology, agriculture, and generational knowledge.

At the Colorado State University Potato Program, the fellows explored potato production, from seed development to market economics. Richard Hubler from Alamosa County then guided us through several solar installations, opening conversations about energy, land use, and competing priorities.

Traveling south to Conejos County with our partner Angie Mestas, the fellows encountered a different landscape while learning about ranching, ditch systems, and flood irrigation from Regan Velasquez and Elena Miller-terKuile.

At Fort Garland Museum, conversations with artist Chip Thomas and museum director Eric Carpio expanded our understanding of the valley’s histories and how to communicate complex stories.

Before splitting into synthesis groups, we toured the Rio Grande Farm Park with Jesús Flores and learned about indigenous planning from Ted Jojola. We concluded by collectively mapping observations and questions before entering the next phase of the workshop.

07/16/2026

Join us for Designing for Adaptation: A Symposium.

On Saturday, July 25, we’ll gather at Adams State in Alamosa, Colorado - and online - for an afternoon of conversations about drought, water, and the future of the American West.

This free public symposium is the culminating public event of the Wright-Ingraham Institute’s 2026 Field Workshop. Over the past three weeks, twelve extraordinary fellows from across the arts and sciences have worked alongside farmers, water managers, land stewards, conservation practitioners, and community leaders across the San Luis Valley and northern New Mexico to explore what meaningful drought adaptation can look like in practice.

The symposium will begin with a short keynote from Amber Pacheco of the Rio Grande Water Conservation District, followed by presentations from three interdisciplinary teams focused on:
* Forest and watershed stewardship
* Groundwater transition and agricultural resilience
* Acequia and ditch systems

Whether you join us in person or on Zoom, we hope you’ll be part of the conversation.

Saturday, July 25, 2026
1:30–6:00 pm MDT
Adams State University, Alamosa, Colorado
or live on Zoom

Free to attend. Registration is required.

Please share this with anyone who may be interested in the future of land, water, and communities in the Southwest.

Registration link in bio.

07/10/2026

Learning from the Ground Up and the Sky Down: Integrative Education at the Running Creek Field Station

In this month’s Integrative Futures (IF) Substack, Dylan Gauthier reports on the history of the Running Creek Field Station, the Institute’s original educational initiative. This summer, packing for our Field Workshop in the San Luis Valley, we found ourselves looking back at how that work began.

In 1970, architect and systems thinker Elizabeth “Liz” Wright Ingraham founded the Running Creek Field Station on 640 acres of mixed grassland outside Colorado Springs, CO. For thirteen successive summers, students lived and studied at RCFS, joined by visiting faculty from a wide range of disciplines, all asking some version of the same question: what does it mean to learn from a place directly.

The observational methods and interdisciplinary practices born at RCFS feel newly relevant — and urgent — today.

Drawing on conversations with RCFS alumni and Liz’s writings, we traced the roots of this work and how it still grounds what we’re doing this month in the San Luis Valley.

Link in bio to read the full piece on our Substack!

07/10/2026