Farmer Matt Romero has grown salad greens and other crops on his small farms in Dixon and Alcalde for 18 years.

He doesn’t have far to travel to see a stark reminder of the ongoing drought affecting New Mexico and parts of the West when he looks over the bridge that crosses Embudo Creek just outside his Dixon home.

“There is no water at that bridge and there has been no water for a month,” said Romero, who sells his crops to restaurants and at the Santa Fe Farmers Market.

Donald Martinez, Rio Arriba County’s agricultural agent, is in touch with farmers around the county and said farmers and acequia communities have to be resourceful and talk to one another so farms get their water shares. Rio Arriba County has many small-scale vegetable, fruit and hay farmers, and the story is the same throughout the area for those who need water to grow crops: The reports of rivers drying up in Central New Mexico send shivers through those who see those same stream flows weakening in the north.