Elephant Butte Reservoir is a reservoir

Reservoir

A reservoir , artificial lake or dam is used to store water.Reservoirs may be created in river valleys by the construction of a dam or may be built by excavation in the ground or by conventional construction techniques such as brickwork or cast concrete.The term reservoir may also be used to...

 on the Rio Grande

Rio Grande

The Rio Grande is a river that flows from southwestern Colorado in the United States to the Gulf of Mexico. Along the way it forms part of the Mexico – United States border. Its length varies as its course changes...

 in the U.S. state

U.S. state

A U.S. state is any one of the 50 federated states of the United States of America that share sovereignty with the federal government. Because of this shared sovereignty, an American is a citizen both of the federal entity and of his or her state of domicile. Four states use the official title of...

 of New Mexico

New Mexico

New Mexico is a state located in the southwest and western regions of the United States. New Mexico is also usually considered one of the Mountain States. With a population density of 16 per square mile, New Mexico is the sixth-most sparsely inhabited U.S...

, 5 miles (8 km) north of Truth or Consequences

Truth or Consequences, New Mexico

Truth or Consequences is a spa city and the county seat of Sierra County, New Mexico, United States. As of the 2000 census, the population was 7,289. It is commonly known within New Mexico as T or C....

. It is impounded by Elephant Butte Dam

Elephant Butte Dam

Elephant Butte Dam or Elephant Butte Dike is a concrete gravity dam on the Rio Grande near Truth or Consequences, New Mexico. The river was dammed here, impounding the Elephant Butte Reservoir for recreation and agriculture, lessening the downstream flow from a Rio Bravo to a stream a foot deep.The...

 and is the largest reservoir in New Mexico. The reservoir is also part of the largest state park in New Mexico, Elephant Butte Lake State Park

Elephant Butte Lake State Park

Elephant Butte Lake State Park is a state park of New Mexico, USA, located north of Truth or Consequences along the shore of Elephant Butte Reservoir. It is the largest state park in New Mexico and surrounds the state's largest reservoir...

.

The reservoir is part of the Rio Grande Project, a project to provide power and irrigation to south-central New Mexico and west Texas

Texas

Texas is the second largest U.S. state by both area and population, and the largest state by area in the contiguous United States.The name, based on the Caddo word "Tejas" meaning "friends" or "allies", was applied by the Spanish to the Caddo themselves and to the region of their settlement in...

. It was filled starting between 1915 and 1916.

The reservoir can hold 2065010 acre.ft of water from a drainage of 28,900 square miles (74,850 km²). It provides irrigation to 178,000 acres (720 km²) of land.

The name "Elephant Butte" refers to a volcanic core similar to Devils Tower

Devils Tower National Monument

Devils Tower is an igneous intrusion or laccolith located in the Black Hills near Hulett and Sundance in Crook County, northeastern Wyoming, above the Belle Fourche River...

 in Wyoming

Wyoming

Wyoming is a state in the mountain region of the Western United States. The western two thirds of the state is covered mostly with the mountain ranges and rangelands in the foothills of the Eastern Rocky Mountains, while the eastern third of the state is high elevation prairie known as the High...

. It is now an island in the lake. The butte was said to have the shape of an elephant

Elephant

Elephants are large land mammals in two extant genera of the family Elephantidae: Elephas and Loxodonta, with the third genus Mammuthus extinct...

.

Fishing

Fishing

Fishing is the activity of trying to catch wild fish. Fish are normally caught in the wild. Techniques for catching fish include hand gathering, spearing, netting, angling and trapping....

 is a popular recreational activity on the reservoir, which contains striped bass

Striped bass

The striped bass is the state fish of Maryland, Rhode Island, South Carolina, and the state saltwater fish of New York, Virginia, and New Hampshire...

, white bass

White bass

The white bass or sand bass The white bass or sand bass The white bass or sand bass (MoroneIt is the state fish of Oklahoma.- Range :White bass are distributed widely across the United States, particularly in the midwest. They are very abundant in Pennsylvania and the area around Lake Erie...

, largemouth bass

Largemouth bass

The largemouth bass is a species of black bass in the sunfish family native to North America . It is also known as widemouth bass, bigmouth, black bass, bucketmouth, Potter's fish, Florida bass, Florida largemouth, green bass, green trout, linesides, Oswego bass, southern largemouth...

, crappie

Crappie

Crappie is a genus of freshwater fish in the sunfish family of order Perciformes. The type species is P. annularis, the white crappie...

, walleye

Walleye

Walleye is a freshwater perciform fish native to most of Canada and to the northern United States. It is a North American close relative of the European pikeperch...

 and catfish

Catfish

Catfishes are a diverse group of ray-finned fish. Named for their prominent barbels, which resemble a cat's whiskers, catfish range in size and behavior from the heaviest and longest, the Mekong giant catfish from Southeast Asia and the second longest, the wels catfish of Eurasia, to detritivores...

.