At the wine tasting room of Taylors Wines in Sydney, Australia, bottles are uncorked, poured, swished, sniffed and sipped. There’s a lot for employees to toast this year. … That’s thanks, in part, to China.
The Department of Water Resources (DWR) is urging boaters and recreational users to avoid direct contact with or use of waters containing blue-green algae (cyanobacteria) in San Luis Reservoir in Merced County. The recommendation is based on the potential health risks from the algae. Water sampled on June 19 at the Basalt Boat Launch contained approximately 10 micrograms per liter of microcystins, a level that prompts warning signs to be posted at the reservoir.
The seemingly contradictory weather conditions — a heat wave and mountains still piled high with snow — are one final legacy of a historic winter that brought the most rain ever recorded in Northern California. Months of back-to-back storms finally pulled California out of its five-year drought. But they left behind up to 200 inches of snow.
The Trump administration on Monday threw out a new rule intended to limit the number of endangered whales and sea turtles caught in fishing nets off the West Coast, saying existing protections were already working.
Deadly heat waves like the one now broiling the American West are bigger killers than previously thought and they are going to grow more frequent, according to a new comprehensive study of fatal heat conditions. Still, those stretches may be less lethal in the future, as people become accustomed to them.
During drought, people conserve water. That’s a good thing for public water agencies and the state as a whole but the reduction in use ultimately means less money flowing into the budgets of those very agencies that need funds to treat water to drinkable standards, maintain a distribution system, and build a more drought-proof supply.
In singing about the Kern River, Merle Haggard put it best: “It’s a mean piece of water, my friend.” As a heat wave tightens its grip on California, the water in the massive Sierra Nevada snowpack is being squeezed into the state’s rivers and reservoirs, creating dangerous conditions downstream.
The Central California tiger salamander, currently federally listed as threatened, will get a boost toward its recovery with the release of a plan by the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service including guidelines to combat the introduction of a non-native Texas salamander threatening the local population.
The grow sites were located at Fay Creek and Brush Creek, tributaries of the Kern River, and the Needles, a series of massive granite rock formations near the North Fork of the Kern River.
Last week, Michigan’s top prosecutor announced that five officials, including the state’s Health Department head Nick Lyon, will face charges of involuntary manslaughter for a death resulting from the Flint water crisis.
The Holcomb fire just north of Big Bear Lake continues to burn without containment Tuesday morning, according to the latest information from the National Forest Service.
On a recent, sweltering Monday afternoon, the winding road tracking the Whitewater River and leading up to the preserve of the same name was dotted with parked cars. Their drivers and riders could be found in the river or toweling off on its banks, in full view of signs letting them know the area was closed for the summer due to wildfire hazards.
It’s hot outside. Really hot. So hot, the National Weather Service has issued an excessive heat warning for areas of Southern California, specifically the Inland areas through Wednesday, when temperatures could reach 112 degrees.
Tuesday is the official start of summer, but Bay Area residents are already getting a taste of the dog days of August, with temperatures that broke records over the weekend forecast to stay sweltering in much of the region for the rest of the week.
Fresno is expected to either beat or tie heat records Monday through Thursday, and even then, the area won’t see a relief from triple digits until early next week, according to Jim Bagnall, a National Weather Service meteorologist in Hanford. … The Merced River near Pohono Bridge reached flood stage as of 10 a.m. Monday, and the flood warning remains in effect.
Summer has arrived. Redding can expect triple-digit temperatures through Wednesday, and the National Weather Service is cautioning that everyone should prepare for the heat.
Record-breaking temperatures that stoked a wildfire near Castaic Lake and other Southern California locations continued to rise Monday and will peak Tuesday, according to the National Weather Service.
Ease off on your dishwasher and other appliances, if you can. California’s heat wave is approaching record proportions, with multiple days of 100-degree temperatures, soaring demand for electricity and rising danger from forest fires.
