The Moreau River Is Dry

The Moreau River is a tributary of the Missouri River, approximately 200 miles long, in South Dakota in the United States. And due to intense drought, it is now dry.


Photo by JONATHAN ERNST
A man holds up a catfish carcass in the dried-out Moreau River on the Cheyenne River Indian reservation near Thunder Butte, South Dakota August 7, 2006. A severe drought has killed crops, left ideal conditions for wildfires, forced ranchers to sell cattle and has evoked memories of the Dust Bowl disaster in the 1930s.

The Moreau River

And it isn't as though this isn't a known fact. This document mentions specifically that the Moreau River's water levels tend to coincide withe the Missouri River because of its shape. Therefore, considering there is such an intense drought currently exacerbating this condition, why aren't measures being taken to protect the life in this river? Not only is this drought effecting the water level, it is effecting the livelihoods of the people who live along this river, and the life in it that depends on it. I guess because it flows near a reservation the government doesn't really give a damn.

I'm looking into this, and more information will follow.