Dove Creek, Colorado
12 topographic sheets cover this place, the earliest surveyed in 1956 and the latest in 1994. It stands in the Dove Creek census division. It lies in ZIP code area 81324. The Survey maps it on the Dove Creek quadrangle. 635 people lived here at the 2020 count. It stands 6,844 feet above sea level.
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Population over time
2 figuresDove Creek fell from 735 to 635 between 2010 and 2020. These are the recorded population figures Wikidata holds for this place, reached through the Geographic Names Information System number this page is keyed on rather than by name, so they belong to this place and not to another of the same name. Most are census counts, but not all are: an early figure may be a founding or settlement estimate, and an estimate published within five years of a census is left out. The change column is computed, and is left blank where more than 20 years separate a figure from the one before it, because a gap that long is not a change between two counts.
| Year | People | Change |
|---|---|---|
| 2010 | 735 | |
| 2020 | 635 | -100 (-14%) |
Topographic sheets covering this place
8 surveys from 12 printed sheetsMatched by testing this settlement's coordinate against the published boundary of every sheet in the United States Geological Survey's historical collection. Each opens the scanned sheet at the Survey.
- 1956 USGS Cortez quadrangle1:250000, 2 printings
- 1958 USGS Cortez quadrangle1:250000
- 1959 USGS Cortez quadrangle1:250000, 2 printings
- 1962 USGS Cortez quadrangle1:250000
- 1964 USGS Dove Creek quadrangle1:24000, 3 printings
- 1966 USGS Cortez quadrangle1:250000
- 1982 USGS Dove Creek quadrangle1:100000
- 1994 USGS Dove Creek quadrangle1:24000
Fires near this place
12 since 1993Regional context, not property-specific evidence. The federal wildfire occurrence database lists 12 fires within 5 miles of Dove Creek between 1993 and 2020, burning about 4 acres in total. 9 started naturally. None was recorded as arson. Distance is straight-line from the map coordinates, so a fire counted here may appear on a neighbouring settlement's page as well.
| Reported cause | Fires |
|---|---|
| Natural | 9 |
| Smoking | 1 |
| Recreation and ceremony | 1 |
| Missing data/not specified/undetermined | 1 |
The most recent of them, most recent first, with the day each was reported and the service that recorded it.
| Date | Cause | Size | Reported by | Name on the report |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 9 September 1993 | Natural | under an acre | San Juan National Forest | VAPOR |
| 6 September 2005 | Natural | 1.0 acres | Tres Rios Field Office | COYOTE |
| 4 September 2009 | Natural | under an acre | Tres Rios Field Office | RIVER |
| 6 July 2007 | Natural | under an acre | Tres Rios Field Office | RABBIT |
| 25 July 1994 | Natural | under an acre | Southwest District, Montrose | MTN SHEEP |
| 23 July 2002 | Natural | under an acre | Ute Mountain Ute Agency | BIGCANYON2 |
| 3 June 2018 | Natural | under an acre | Tres Rios Field Office | MOUNTAIN SHEEP |
| 24 June 2011 | Recreation and ceremony | under an acre | Tres Rios Field Office | SHEEP POINT |
Settlements close enough to share some of these fires:
Mines and quarries near this place
6 within 5 milesRegional context, not property-specific evidence. The federal mineral resources record lists 6 workings within 5 miles of Dove Creek: 3 past producers, 2 producers, 1 occurrence. 2 still produce. What was taken out: Sand and Gravel, Construction, Uranium, Vanadium, Silver. Distance is straight-line from the map coordinates, so a quarry counted here may appear on a neighbouring settlement's page as well.
| Where | Site | Commodity | Status | Recorded |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Fritz and Erickson | Silver | Past Producer | ||
| Pack Rat | Uranium, Vanadium | Past Producer | ||
| Rainy Day | Uranium, Vanadium | Past Producer | ||
| Gravel Pit | Sand and Gravel, Construction | Producer | ||
| Gravel Pit | Sand and Gravel, Construction | Producer | ||
| Unknown | Sand and Gravel, Construction | Occurrence | Gravel |
Storms near this place
18 since 1997Regional context, not property-specific evidence. The National Weather Service names Dove Creek in 18 storm reports between 1997 and 2020: 4 hail, 4 thunderstorm wind, 4 heavy rain, 2 flash flood. No death or injury is recorded in these reports. Each account below is quoted exactly as the forecast office filed it, from the NOAA Storm Events Database, and each date opens the federal record of that event.
| When | Event | Place named | Harm | What the report says |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| September 2013 | Hail | Dove Creek | $25,000 | Ping pong ball sized hail was observed at intersection of Highway 141 and County Road E. |
| September 2002 | Thunderstorm Wind | Dove Creek | $25,000 | no account filed |
| September 2013 | Hail | Dove Creek | $20,000 | Ping pong ball sized hail was reported. |
| September 2002 | Thunderstorm Wind | Dove Creek | $10,000 | no account filed |
| September 2003 | Hail | Dove Creek | $5,000 | no account filed |
| September 2004 | Dust Devil | Dove Creek | $2,000 | no account filed |
| May 1997 | Lightning | Dove Creek | $1,000 | no account filed |
| June 2020 | Thunderstorm Wind | Dove Creek | - | A peak wind gust of 59 mph was measured by the Dove Creek automated weather station. |
| July 2017 | Flash Flood | Dove Creek | - | Heavy rainfall resulted in up to a foot of water depth that flowed across Colorado Highway 141 north of Dove Creek. |
| September 2013 | Flash Flood | Dove Creek | - | Coal Bed Creek was out of its banks. Mud and debris also flowed underneath Highway 491 through a sixteen foot diameter culvert that was 3/4 full. |
| August 2012 | Heavy Rain | Dove Creek | - | A rainfall total of 1.30 inches fell in less than an hour near Dove Creek. No significant flooding was reported. |
| July 2011 | Heavy Rain | Dove Creek | - | A rainfall total of 0.74 within 30 minutes resulted in minor street flooding. |
| August 2007 | Heavy Rain | Dove Creek | - | Rainfall runoff from slow moving thunderstorms over northwest Dolores County deposited debris at various locations on Highway 141. Colorado Department of Transportation road crews used plows to clear the debris. |
| April 2006 | Thunderstorm Wind | Dove Creek | - | no account filed |
| December 2004 | Heavy Rain | Dove Creek | - | no account filed |
| September 2002 | Flood | Dove Creek | - | no account filed |
| March 2000 | Funnel Cloud | Dove Creek | - | no account filed |
| October 2000 | Hail | Dove Creek | - | no account filed |
Nearest settlements
The eight closest, with where each one stands in the county. Distances are straight-line, computed from the Geographic Names Information System coordinates.
Elsewhere
Matched on this settlement's Geographic Names Information System number rather than its name, so it cannot be a different place of the same name in another state.
| Wikipedia article on Dove Creek | An encyclopaedic summary. Its text is share-alike, so it is linked here rather than copied. |
| Wikidata item Q2278216 | The structured record the population and elevation above come from. Public domain (CC0). |
Provenance
This settlement is recorded in the Geographic Names Information System as feature 176436. The sheet list is computed by point-in-boundary test against the United States Geological Survey's historical topographic inventory. Both are works of the United States government and carry no copyright under 17 U.S.C. 105.
Wildfire. Short, Karen C. 2022. Spatial wildfire occurrence data for the United States, 1992-2020 [FPA_FOD_20221014]. 6th Edition. Fort Collins, CO: Forest Service Research Data Archive. https://doi.org/10.2737/RDS-2013-0009.6 Collected with United States Government funding and usable without additional permissions or fees.
Mines and quarries. USGS Mineral Resources Data System (MRDS) https://mrdata.usgs.gov/mrds/ A work of the United States government, no copyright under 17 U.S.C. 105.
Storms. NOAA National Centers for Environmental Information, Storm Events Database https://www.ncei.noaa.gov/stormevents/ A work of the United States government, no copyright under 17 U.S.C. 105. Narratives are quoted verbatim from the National Weather Service report and are not edited or summarised.







