Abstract
This article is a basic but global study of a specific ethno-ecological case in northern New Mexico and Southern Colorado by Devon G. Peña. The main concern of Peña is the importance of the irrigation system of the Chicano communities that have been living in the Culebra micro-basin for around 150 years (after the Sangre de Cristo land grant issued in 1844). The importance of the irrigation system, is that it is based on the acequia, or gravity ditch system. This not only consists in its environmentally adaptive and preservative capability but also in that it ensures the conservation of self-governing communities in the Upper Río Grande which, in return, enable a local and environmentally respectful "management of water rights and stewardship of the watershed commons" that increase biodiversity.
