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Just like the old cowboy song, Sandoval County families faced the barren waste without the taste of water. Until now.

All right, while our canteens hadn't gone bone dry exactly, environmentalists, anti-developer sorts and folks who just can't stand the idea of more affordable homes being built anywhere west of the Rio Grande, have long predicted parched futures for those who wouldn't heed their Doomsday prophecies.

Casting aside doubt and peer ridicule, a group of brave, dare I say, heroic, Sandoval County engineers followed their scientific hunches and searched for water in the Rio Puerco basin.

Low - at nearly 4,000 feet to be precise - and behold if the lads didn't succeed.

Water. Cool. Clear. Brackish. Salt water. And lots of it, preliminary reports indicate.

Sandoval County officials proudly announced the discovery of the underground water recently, which suggests a supply of perhaps 50,000 acre-feet annually for the next 100 years.

Finding water - particularly so much of it - is major news.

It's also a tribute to our dogged persistence in the face of constant negativity. Almost daily, you could find an article calling for an end to development in Sandoval County because there was simply no more water to be found. And then someone found it.

Of course, even prior to the Rio Puerco find, a young environmental lawyer from Denver told me that, in reality, water would "always be available.

"It's just a matter of how much you want to pay for it," he added with a smirk.

Still, the Rio Puerco discovery should give pause to those who assign absolute scientific bottom lines to important matters such as water, global warming, the existence of God - matters that might demand more critical review. Unfortunately, it won't.

And don't count on anyone who has spent time and ink predicting the new dust bowl to accompany human-caused global warming to offer conciliatory words to those who envisioned folks living in places called Rio West or Mariposa. That's not going to happen, either.

And while some developers are suspect, most simply go where the trail (the market) leads them. The trail in our little slice of Heaven leads west by northwest.

Now will come words of warning about the false sense of security they believe this water find will produce.

Such cautionary words are justified. But I don't think most people in Rio Rancho are rushing to turn their sprinklers on 24/7.

So, is it too much to ask for tempered words of caution?

Probably.

Just like it's too much to ask if documented increases in the sun's surface temperature is producing temperature increases in our atmosphere. Can't be done without bringing down the wrath of activist scientists upon one's pate.

I always imagined scientists as fearless sorts, though.

Unafraid of a question or two.

Men and women searching for answers, unlocking more questions, welcoming differing opinions. And finding water.