An ecosystem includes all of the living organisms (plants,
animals and microbes) in a given area, interacting with each
other, and also with their non-living environments (air, water
and soil).
Ecosystems are dynamic and are impacted by disturbances such as a
drought, an extraordinarily freezing winter, and pests.
Longer-term disturbances include climate change effects.
Ecosystems provide a variety of goods and services upon which
people depend. Ecosystem management emphasizes managing natural
resources at the level of the ecosystem itself and not just
managing individual species.
The California Legislature was the first in the country to
protect rare plants and animals through passage of the California
Endangered Species Act in 1970. Congress followed suit in 1973 by
passing the federal Endangered Species Act.
Sonoma wildlife conservationists had one word to describe Gov.
Gavin Newsom’s proposed new Beaver Restoration program:
“Damtastic!” Newsom floated the program as part of a May 13
presentation of his revised 2022-2023 fiscal budget. Pledging
$1.67 million this year and $1.44 million in years thereafter,
Newsom said the funds would go toward the Department of Fish
and Wildlife’s efforts in developing “a comprehensive beaver
management plan.” The North American Beaver is considered a
“keystone species” by Fish and Wildlife …
A wine executive faces millions in fines after razing dozens of
acres of trees for a vineyard in California, water officials
said. The clearing of the oak woodlands caused “significant
damage to the streams and wetlands” in the former Alexander
Valley Ranch in 2018, according to a news release from the
North Coast Regional Water Quality Control Board. Hugh Reimers
and his business Krasilsa Pacific Farms, LLC face a $3.75
million fine from the state board, according to the May 24 news
release.
During the 2021 runoff year (April 1, 2021–March 31, 2022), the
Los Angeles Department of Water & Power (DWP) was allowed to
export up to 16,000 acre-feet of stream diversions from the
Mono Basin because Mono Lake was above 6380 feet above sea
level on April 1, 2021. Yet, only 13,300 acre-feet of water was
taken, consistent with the low reservoir requirements in DWP’s
water licenses, which were amended last year by the California
State Water Resources Control Board. The new licenses contain
an overall minimum level of 11,500 acre-feet of storage for
Grant Lake Reservoir, with a minimum of 20,000 acre-feet for
July–September.
A well-known Sonoma County vineyard executive is facing a
multi-million-dollar state fine for allegedly removing trees
and destroying a small wetland on a rural patch of land east of
Cloverdale. Hugh Reimers and Krasilsa Pacific Farms could be on
the hook for up to $3.75 million in fines for allegedly cutting
down trees, grading, ripping and other activities near
tributaries to Little Sulphur Creek, Big Sulphur Creek and
Crocker Creek in the Russian River Watershed … In a complaint
filed May 9, the Water Board accused Reimers and Krasilsa
Pacific Farms of also failing to abide by a 2019 cleanup and
abatement order, which required them to restore the streams and
wetlands.
Everyone boating in Lake Tahoe already goes through a process
of “Clean, Drain, Dry” protocols prior to launching to keep
invasive species out of the big, beautiful lake. But what about
other vessels in the lake like paddle boards, electric
surfboards, kayaks, and canoes? … For pristine
waters that have no invasive species, such as Echo Lakes,
Angora, and Fallen Leaf lakes, even Lake Tahoe is considered a
threat from the Eurasian watermilfoil, curlyleaf pondweed, and
Asian clams currently found in Big Blue.
Gobs of oily tar continue to slip past containment booms and
drain into the Smith River, nearly a month after an overturned
trailer spilled 2,000 gallons of the hot asphalt binder onto
U.S. 199 between Hiouchi and Gasquet. Spokesperson Eric
Laughlin with the California Department of Fish and Wildlife’s
Office of Spill Prevention and Response confirmed with the
Outpost that the toxic goop is actively leaking into the Smith
River, and that the agency received new reports of the material
traveling downstream on Friday.
If you think about the pollution your car causes, chances are
you’re not thinking about the tires. And probably even less
about a faraway creek, where a Coho Salmon is dying. But
researchers at the University of Washington and elsewhere
… say as the rubber wears away from car tires during
everyday driving, it spreads tiny micro particles, including a
destructive chemical called 6PPD. … Now, with
information gathered in part by the [San Francisco Estuary]
Institute, the State of California is stepping in, laying the
groundwork for potential regulations to curb the toxic tire
pollution.
Today, there are hundreds of hatcheries in the Northwest run by
federal, state and tribal governments … The fish they send to
the Pacific Ocean have allowed restaurants and grocery seafood
counters to offer “wild-caught” Chinook salmon even as the fish
became endangered. The hatcheries were supposed to stop the
decline of salmon. They haven’t. The numbers of each of the six
salmon species native to the Columbia basin have dropped to a
fraction of what they once were, and 13 distinct populations
are now considered threatened or endangered.
Tribes and environmental groups are challenging how the state
manages water in the Sacramento-San Joaquin River Delta, a
major source for much of California, arguing the deterioration
of the aquatic ecosystem has links to the state’s troubled
legacy of racism and oppression of Native people. A group of
activists and Indigenous leaders is demanding that the state
review and update the water quality plan for the Delta and San
Francisco Bay, where fish species are suffering, algae blooms
have worsened and climate change is adding to the
stresses.
Assemblyman Adam Gray, D-Merced, is maneuvering against a bill
that seeks higher flows on local rivers. Assembly Bill 2639
would set a Dec. 31, 2023, deadline for the State Water
Resources Control Board to complete its plan for tributaries to
the Sacramento-San Joaquin Delta. They include the Stanislaus,
Tuolumne and Merced rivers. The decision would follow decades
of wrangling over whether fish should get more water on the
lower rivers at the expense of farms and cities.
Central California Coast steelhead historically thrived in Bay
Area waters, but today, populations are collapsing with only a
fraction of their historical abundance remaining, according to
CalTrout’s SOS II Report. California Trout, along with our
partners at California Department of Fish and Wildlife, San
Mateo Resource Conservation District (RCD), Trout Unlimited,
and others such as California State Parks, private landowners,
and NOAA Fisheries- the federal agency tasked with managing
steelhead and salmon nationwide- are determined to improve this
system for the overall health of the watershed and for its
inhabitants — both fish and people.
As drought conditions continue, people who rely on the
Sacramento-San Joaquin Delta are demanding California make sure
their communities are protected. Early Tuesday, a group
gathered in front of the California State Water Resources
Control Board building to demand the state enforce the
Bay-Delta plan. It’s been a long fight and the group said
enough is enough. For many of the tribes, the Delta is an
important lifeline.
Today, Congressman John Garamendi (D-CA), who represents Solano
Country and the Sacramento-San Joaquin Delta in the 3rd
Congressional District, released the following statement on the
passage of the “Water Resources Development Act (WRDA) of 2022”
(H.R.7776) in the House Committee on Transportation and
Infrastructure: “The biennial Water Resources Development Act
strengthens flood protection, water resources, precious
ecosystems, and more in communities across California and the
nation”…
When you picture water storage, a water tower on slanted stilts
imposed upon a blue sky or a concrete reservoir piping water to
the city might come to mind. The issue of water storage has
become a high priority as regions such as California experience
severe multi-year drought and are impacted by overextraction
from aquifers. … The most climate resilient and long-term
strategies to address water shortage lie at our feet, in the
meadows that anchor our rivers headwaters and floodplains that
extend across the broad lower river valleys.
Veterinarians and researchers at the University of California,
Davis have developed a new way to detect leptospirosis, a
life-threatening bacterial disease, in dogs using artificial
intelligence. Leptospirosis is caused by the Leptospira
bacteria, according to American Veterinary Medical Association,
and it is typically found in soil and water.
… Infections stem from urine-contaminated soil, food,
bedding or from an animal bite. Dogs can be exposed to the
bacteria from drinking water in rivers, lakes and streams, or
being in contact with infected wildlife, farm animals, rodents
and other dogs.
The lowly sidewalk tree often stands invisible. We rest in its
shade, bask in the scent of springtime flowers, and we don’t
notice it until it’s gone. But the tree works hard. It captures
and filters stormwater runoff and helps replenish groundwater.
It cleans our air and cools our neighborhoods. It improves our
mental health. It saves lives. With Southern California
officials clamping down on outdoor water use amid worsening
drought, the message is clear: It’s fine for lawns to go brown,
but we need to keep trees alive and healthy.
The fish need the water, the farmers and ranchers need the
water, and the fish win. Because coho salmon are on the
Endangered Species List in the region, and the Scott and Shasta
Rivers are important to their survival. The State of California
put emergency rules in place governing groundwater around those
rivers, and the people in agriculture take exception. We hear
the environmental side of the issue in this interview. Craig
Tucker, Natural Resources Policy Advocate for the Karuk Tribe,
lays out the importance of the water for the fish …
After nearly two years of a collaborative effort led by the
Delta Stewardship Council’s Delta Science Program, the wait is
finally over. We’re excited and proud to present the final
2022-2026 SAA for the Delta. … Scientists, managers, and
those with a stake in the Delta were invited to participate in
two public workshops, four online surveys, and four review
periods and were engaged in various collaborative venues. The
collaborative process was a critical component of this SAA and
built on the success of the 2017-2021 SAA, which guided over
$35 million from the Council and its partners for
management-relevant research.
This blog is a short introduction to a lesser known federal
bill that is one of the most significant pieces of fish and
wildlife legislation in decades. In Spring of 2021, Rep. Debbie
Dingell (D-Mich.) and Rep. Jeff Fortenberry (R-Neb.) introduced
the Recovering America’s Wildlife Act. During July 2021, a
separate adaptation of the act was also introduced in the
Senate (S.2372) by Sen. Martin Heinrich (D-NM) and Sen. Roy
Blunt (R-MO). At its core, the bipartisan bill seeks to provide
$1.39B in annual funding for state and tribal fish and wildlife
agencies to protect and conserve declining species.
Those who regularly cross the Napa Creek footbridge from
Clinton Street to Coombs Street in downtown Napa might be
unaware of the beavers that live below. The thick-furred,
aqueous mammals are nocturnal, after all, and tend to go about
their wood-gnawing, dam-building business when people aren’t
around to watch them. They also haven’t been in the Downtown
Napa area for all that long, though the increasing presence of
them around the city of Napa in recent years has often been
heralded as a sign of environmental success connected to the
millions spent on flood control projects over the past few
decades.
After decades of negotiation, the largest dam-removal project
in U.S. history is expected to begin in California’s far north
next year. The first of four aging dams on the Klamath River,
the 250-mile waterway that originates in southern Oregon’s
towering Cascades and empties along the rugged Northern
California coast, is on track to come down in fall 2023. Two
others nearby and one across the state line will follow.
… The native flora and fauna in the region are bound to
prosper as algae-infested reservoirs at the dams are emptied,
the flow of the river quickens and cools, and river passage
swings wide open.
New Mexico State University’s Forestry Research Center in the
mountain community of Mora is one of only a few such nurseries
in the country and stands at the forefront of a major
undertaking to rebuild more resilient forests as wildfires burn
hotter, faster and more often. … With no shortage of
burn scars around the West, researchers and private groups such
as The Nature Conservancy have been tapping New Mexico State
University’s center for seedlings to learn how best to restore
forests after the flames are extinguished. The center has
provided sprouts for projects in New Mexico, Arizona, Colorado,
Utah, Texas and California …
In the current legislative session, lawmakers are working on a
bill designed to reduce plastic waste. If they are unable to
draft legislation by June 30, the issue will go straight to
voters as a ballot measure. The initiative, the California
Recycling and Plastic Pollution Reduction Act, would require
all single-use plastic packaging and food ware used in
California to be recyclable, reusable, refillable or
compostable by 2030. … Over the last year, research has
shown the presence of these particles in human
blood, healthy lung tissue and meconium — the
first bowel movement of a newborn. They are also found in
marine organisms, ocean water, air and soil.
The Clear Lake hitch is one of 13 species endemic to
California’s largest, oldest and now most toxic lake. Known
as chi to local tribes, the hitch teeter on the edge
of extinction, a fate to which their cousins, two other
formerly endemic lake species — the thicktail chub (last seen
in 1938) and the Clear Lake splittail (last seen in the
1970s) — have already succumbed. Clear Lake hitch are
vanishing because of our unabated appetites for fossil fuels,
sportfishing, irrigation water and wine.
The Colorado River is once again flowing in its delta. The
flows, which began on May 1, are the result of binational
collaboration and deliberate management. The water is dedicated
to supporting the ecosystem and local communities in a
landscape where the river has not flowed for most years
in the past half century. It is a heartening bit of good news
for the Colorado River, which earlier this year was designated
as America’s most endangered river.
In a stopgap measure to help struggling spring- and winter-run
Chinook salmon spawn in the face of rising water temperatures
and lower water levels due to climate change, state and federal
wildlife officials in Northern California have begun trucking
adult fish to cooler waters. The spring- and winter-run salmon
are genetically different, with the seasonal labels marking
when adult fish travel from the Pacific Ocean back to the
Sacramento River to spawn. The spring-run Chinook, listed
as threatened under the Endangered Species Act, are being moved
from traps at the base of Keswick Dam to Clear Creek in the
Sacramento River.
Governor Gavin Newsom is proposing funding to support what he
calls a “creative climate solving hero” – the North American
Beaver. The rodent is known to help restore drought-stricken
areas of California by restoring wetlands and groundwater
basins. The governor is initially requesting more than $3
million in the next few fiscal years to support and maintain a
beaver restoration program within the California Department of
Fish and Wildlife.
The final hurdle is in sight and expected to be overcome, in
the decades-long fight to remove four dams from the Klamath
River and hopefully allow restoration of the river’s Chinook
salmon population which was once the third-largest in the
country, but in recent years has plummeted by as much as
ninety-eight percent. The four dams were built between 1903 and
1967 as part of PacifiCorp’s Klamath Hydroelectric Project and
are now obsolete. Removing them will provide native migratory
fish, like Chinook salmon, access to larger spawning grounds.
It will also help restore the natural flow of the river,
providing innumerable benefits to the entire ecosystem.
The Sacramento–San Joaquin Delta lies at the confluence of two
of the state’s largest rivers. Forty percent of California’s
runoff flows into the Delta, which—together with the San
Francisco Bay—forms one of the West Coast’s largest estuaries.
The Delta watershed supplies water to roughly 30 million
residents and more than 6 million acres of farmland. Water
exported from the Delta goes to the Bay Area, the southern San
Joaquin Valley, the Central Coast, and Southern California
(first figure).
Los Angeles County on Tuesday, May 17 unveiled its final Los
Angeles River Master Plan, which the county’s Board of
Supervisors will consider for adoption on June 14. The
plan is aimed at improving water quality, increasing wildlife
habitat and biodiversity and creating equitable access to
parks. Among its specific goals are: Creating 51 miles of
connected open space along the entire river; Building
support facilities along the river; … increasing habitat
and ecosystem function along the river corridor and using it as
a living laboratory …
In a sophisticated chemical analysis published Tuesday in
Environmental Science & Technology, the team found that
DDT-related chemicals were seven times more abundant in coastal
condors than condors that fed farther inland. Looking at the
birds’ coastal food sources, researchers found that dolphin and
sea lion carcasses that washed ashore in Southern California
were also seven times more contaminated with DDT than the
marine mammals they analyzed along the Gulf of California in
Mexico.
East County officials fear a $950 million sewage recycling
project could get flushed down the drain because of a pipeline
deal gone awry. Leaders spearheading the endeavor blame San
Diego Mayor Todd Gloria — who signed off on building an
eight-mile “brine line” as recently as last year but has since
reneged on that commitment. The pipeline would prevent
concentrated waste generated by the East County project’s
reverse osmosis filtration system from entering into the city’s
own $5 billion Pure Water sewage recycling project now under
construction.
Gov. Gavin Newsom is urging Californians to find ways to reduce
their water use in an effort to combat the historic drought and
said upcoming conservation mandates are a priority. The
governor visited a water recycling facility Tuesday afternoon
in Carson. It was originally built as a demonstration project
to recycle household wastewater and replenish groundwater
supplies…. Statewide, water consumption is up just 3.7% since
July compared to 2020, woefully short of Newsom’s 15% goal.
Newsom pledged to spend $100 million on a statewide advertising
campaign to encourage water conservation.
Most people have never heard of Sites, California. It’s just a
tiny dot on maps, little more than an intersection in the road
on the remote west side of rural Colusa County in Northern
California. But the surrounding Antelope Valley, where
wildflowers bloom and cattle graze on spring grasses, is one of
the next battlegrounds in California’s water wars. Under plans
endorsed by state, federal and local officials, the valley
would be flooded by the Sites Reservoir, a 14,000-acre lake
that would take in water pumped from the Sacramento River and
store it for agricultural and municipal use during dry periods.
California’s towering redwoods have been around for thousands
of years, but the trees are still yielding some surprises about
what makes them so resilient. UC Davis scientists recently
discovered that redwoods have two different types of leaves
… The trees’ peripheral leaves, like those on most
trees, are food producers that convert sunlight into sugar
through photosynthesis. But the axial leaves serve an entirely
different role, researchers found — absorbing water. … [T]he
study is further evidence of the big trees’ ability to adapt to
environmental changes — including drought.
Lemoore is speaking out against the efforts of an out of town
water entity to export water from the Kings River. The Lemoore
City Council approved a letter in opposition to a petition to
revoke the Fully Appropriated Stream (FAS) status of the Kings
River on Tuesday. The letter is directed to the State Water
Resources Control Board, which is hearing a petition from Kern
County water agency Semitropic Water Storage District to revoke
the FAS status.
The rice farmer John Brennan … [is] collaborating with the
scientist Jacob Katz to turn a piece of the Sacramento Valley,
specifically in the Yolo Bypass, into a floodplain that can be
home to baby Chinook salmon during the winter months, as they
make their way down the river system to the Pacific. Their
experiment, aptly named the Nigiri Project (in reference to the
beds of seasoned sushi rice draped in little blankets of raw
fish), involves flooding Brennan’s rice fields once the grain
has been harvested so that the depleted stalks can decompose in
the water, thereby making those nutrients available to bugs and
plankton, which then serve as food for schools of growing
salmon.
Conditions in the Sacramento-San Joaquin Delta and its
watershed are changing as droughts become warmer and more
intense. But as our new study highlights, California is not
doing a good job of tracking these changes. That’s making it
even tougher to manage the water that is available for the
benefit of the state’s communities, economy and
environment. -Written by Ellen Hanak, director of the Public Policy
Institute of California’s Water Policy Center, and Greg
Gartrell, an independent consulting engineer and an adjunct
fellow at the PPIC Water Policy Center.
A settlement has finally been reached in the seven year-lawsuit
regarding the 2015 Santa Barbara oil spill. Plains All American
Pipeline has agreed to pay $230 million to fishers, fish
processors and shoreline property residents who are members of
two classes in a class-action lawsuit filed against the
company. The lawsuit was filed after a corroded pipeline
spilled an estimated 15,000 barrels of crude oil into the
Pacific Ocean in 2015.
Even if you’ve never heard of imidacloprid, there’s a good
chance the world’s most-used neonicotinoid pesticide is lurking
somewhere in your home. Or on your dog. Or maybe even in your
groundwater or drinking-water supplies. This insecticide,
widely used for decades on fruits, vegetables and many other
crops, has triggered growing concerns over its well-documented
role in the dramatic declines of birds, bees, butterflies and
other insects across the globe. … With imidacloprid being
discovered in groundwater and drinking-water supplies across
the state, state regulators — and legislators — finally are
paying closer attention … -Written by Jonathan Evans, legal director of the
Center for Biological Diversity’s environmental health
program.
Rare traits and behaviors within a population often get less
attention, but might sometimes be the perfect ingredient to
ensure the survival of a species in the face of threats like
climate change. A recent article published in the journal
Nature revealed the surprising success of a rare life-history
strategy for threatened spring-run Chinook salmon. Juveniles
that spent the summer in cool, high-elevation habitat and
migrated in the fall rather than the spring were found to be
crucial to the success of the population, especially in years
experiencing stressful environmental conditions.
California will acquire a sprawling former farm property in the
San Joaquin Valley and create a new state park for the first
time in 13 years. The park is planned for Dos Rios Ranch, where
the San Joaquin and Tuolumne rivers meet southwest of Modesto.
Jamie Traynham has spent nearly half a century in and around
the lush Northern California valley, about 70 miles north of
Sacramento, that is home to her family’s ranch. As a girl, she
and her sister rode their horses through Sites Valley, and
helped build the barn stalls where they raised livestock to
show in local 4-H competitions. As an adult, Traynham and her
husband rent the ranch from her mother and use the land —
typically a sea of green in the rainy season — as a key
winter-feeding location for their cattle.
There is no end in sight for California’s drought. … I
spoke to [professor of civil and environmental engineering at
UC Davis Jay Lund] via email this month and last. A
lightly edited transcript follows. Francis Wilkinson: When
we spoke last summer, you were optimistic about California’s
capacity to manage drought and still prosper. Since then, the
drought has not gotten better … Are you more worried now or
are you still confident that California has enough water for
its economy and its people? Jay Lund: Most of California’s
economy and people will be fine, despite being affected by this
drought.
A Thursday ruling by the California Coastal Commission denying
a Southern California desalination project appears as if it
could impact the prospects of California American Water Co.’s
plan to construct a desal plant along the Monterey Peninsula.
But Cal Am says the Commission’s decision to deny Poseidon
Water Co.’s Huntington Beach project and any impacts on Cal
Am’s long-proposed desal project on the Monterey Peninsula is
comparing apples to oranges.
At a scenic spot where two rivers meet amid sprawling almond
orchards and ranchlands between San Jose and Modesto,
California’s state park system is about to get bigger. On
Friday, as part of his revised May budget, Gov. Gavin Newsom is
scheduled to announce that the state is acquiring 2,100 acres
near the confluence of the San Joaquin and Tuolumne rivers to
become a new state park — an area rich with wildlife and
brimming with possibilities to reduce flood risk and restore
some of California’s lost natural heritage.
Water policy in the Western U.S. has always been a contentious
issue. Changes in water management, however, are slowly
happening. For example, an increasing number of dams are being
deconstructed where environmental, safety, and
Indigenous-cultural impacts outweigh the benefits of
hydropower, flood control, irrigation, or recreation…. More
recently, the issues of water wastage and flood control from
dam removal are being offset by allowing rivers to return to
more natural flow patterns.
The Walbridge fire started in densely forested country just
outside the Austin Creek reserve. It started from a dry
lightning storm Aug. 16 or 17 — the day it was discovered —
spawning flames that roared through the steeply cut, rural
landscape between Cazadero and Healdsburg. It burned for most
of seven weeks, razing 156 homes and blackening 55,209 acres.
But many were riveted by news of its entry into the beloved
park near the Russian River town of Guerneville, where between
700,000 and a million visitors a year flock to see ancient
coast redwood trees — some well over 1,000 years old.
[A crowd has gathered] to stock the pond with over 1,000 young
C’waam and Koptu—Lost River and shortnose suckers, two
endangered species that inhabit Upper Klamath Lake and that are
at the heart of the area’s water conflicts. … The pond
is part of an innovative restoration project at Lakeside Farms,
which is just north of Klamath Falls. … Altogether, it’s a
hopeful demonstration of cooperation in a region that has seen
bitter fights between tribes, farmers, and wildlife advocates
over who gets water.
Siding with public agencies and environmental groups who filed
numerous legal challenges to the “twin tunnel” Delta conveyance
project known as California WaterFix, the Third District Court
of Appeal today unanimously held that the trial court
improperly denied the appellants’ attorneys’ fees motions when
it ruled that their legal challenges were not a “catalyst” for
the State’s 2019 decision to rescind the WaterFix project
approvals and decertify the project environmental impact report
(EIR).
As California battles a historic drought and a water crisis
looms, the state’s coastline protection agency is poised to
vote Thursday on whether it will allow a $1.4 billion
desalinization plant in Huntington Beach that would convert
ocean water into municipal water for Orange County residents.
Poseidon Water, which has been trying to build the plant for
decades, says it would be capable of producing up to 50 million
gallons of drinking water a day, helping to make the region
more drought resilient. But desalination opponents argue less
expensive and less harmful conservation tactics should be the
first resort.
Thousands of water rights holders in the Russian River
watershed could soon lose access to their water after state
regulators approved emergency drought rules Tuesday. The State
Water Resources Control Board voted unanimously to reauthorize
the Division of Water Rights to issue “curtailment orders” for
up to 2,000 rights holders in order to preserve water in Lake
Sonoma and Lake Mendocino and to protect drinking water
supplies and fish populations.
For the 20th year in a row, people from tribal communities
along the Klamath River are preparing to run the more than 300
mile length of the river, tracing the route of the salmon that
are struggling to survive. … A new 13-minute documentary
called “Bring the Salmon Home” by filmmaker Shane Anderson
highlights the Klamath Salmon Run, which is set to begin at
7:30 a.m. Thursday. The Salmon Run was started after a historic
fish kill in 2002 decimated the Klamath River’s salmon.
Your eyes aren’t playing tricks. That honking blob that looked
like a sea lion near Tower Bridge — it probably was one.
Sightings of the marine animals often make their rounds on
Sacramento social media, and can send the average user down a
rabbit hole (if you’re new, or younger than, say, 35 you may
also be excited to learn about Humphrey, the vagabond humpback
whale). But why are these creatures — who typically spend their
time on the coast — appearing so far from the ocean? The
answer’s rather simple: They’re are more of them, and they’re
hungry.
A decade ago, Naomi Oreskes and Erik Conway wrote the seminal
book, Merchants of Doubt: How a Handful of Scientists Obscured
the Truth on Issues from Tobacco Smoke to Global Warming.
Oreskes and Conway documented how scientists paid by the
tobacco industry sowed doubt about the links between smoking
and lung cancer, and how the same strategy has been used with
climate change, acid rain, the ozone hole, and asbestos.
Similar tactics have been used to sow doubt about the causes of
the collapse of native fish populations in the Sacramento-San
Joaquin Delta and its watersheds.
Facing a third year of drought, leadership from county Farm
Bureaus, spanning all regions of California, gathered in
Sacramento last week to engage with state water officials about
all things water. A changing climate, shrinking snowpack, water
rights, aging infrastructure, groundwater regulations and
solutions to the state’s water crisis were among the topics
discussed at the California Farm Bureau Water Forum. The event
brought together state water officials and county Farm Bureau
leaders from the Mountain, North Coast, Central Valley, Central
Coast and Southern California regions.
More organic farming. Less driving. No more natural gas in new
buildings. Electric off-road vehicles. For the first time
in five years, California regulators have released an
ambitious plan for tackling climate change.
… Among the methods: encouraging Californians to eat
plant- or cell-based products instead of meat. Doubling
the amount of acres of cropland that are certified organic.
… Restoring an immense amount of acreage in the
Sacramento-San Joaquin River Delta — 130,000 acres under one
scenario. For context, a state-funded project in the works that
will convert 1,200 acres will have taken 20 years and $63
million when it’s complete.
Research in Seattle-area creeks has discovered tire bits
shedding lethal amounts of a little-known, salmon-killing
chemical called 6PPD-quinone. … In December 2020, 27
coauthors published an article in the journal Science
identifying 6PPD-quinone as the coho killer. Within weeks, the
U.S Tire Manufacturers Association asked California officials
to treat tires with 6PPD as a priority under the state’s
toxic-chemical laws. Coho salmon is an endangered species in
California. The California rule, once finalized, would give
manufacturers of tires sold there 180 days to assess any known
or potential alternatives to 6PPD in tire rubber.
Nearly one year ago, a nonprofit launched an unprecedented
effort to remove trash from Lake Tahoe’s entire 72-mile-long
shoreline. On Tuesday, it completed its mission. Clean Up the
Lake ended up removing 24,797 pieces of litter weighing a
combined 25,281 pounds from the treasured alpine lake on the
California-Nevada border. Since the 72-mile cleanup effort
kicked off on May 14, 2021, Clean Up the Lake’s team of staff
and volunteers spent dozens of days pulling everything from
beer cans and beach towels to engagement rings and a cordless
house phone from the water near shore.
A lack of rainfall across the Golden State and the Central
Coast is limiting blooms and leaving some tourists disappointed
about what’s missing at Carrizo Plain National Monument. Aside
from increasing drought conditions, 2022 started off with the
driest first three months of the year in the last century,
limiting the number of wildflowers able to germinate.
… This lack of blooms is not only due to the dry start
to 2022 but also a buildup of several years of drought.
Every year before the opening day of fishing season, the
California Department of Fish and Wildlife goes on a fishing
trip of their own in Lassen County’s Eagle Lake. Except on this
trip, they don’t use fishing poles or bait. Instead, they
use an electric generator and probes that pump around 48 volts
of electricity into the water. … Biologist Paul Divine and
his team are actually helping to keep one specific kind of fish
from going extinct … Eagle Lake Trout
After years of exclusionary backroom negotiations over
Bay-Delta voluntary agreements, earlier this week the State
made a ham-fisted attempt to greenwash these proposed voluntary
agreements, sending this email inviting a handful of people
who had participated in VA conversations years ago to
participate in “two workshops to finalize the governance and
decision-making process for the implementation of the VA
program.”
Anza-Borrego park has recently come under fire by Jorgensen,
longtime volunteers and others for allegedly neglecting its
guzzler systems, which for decades helped the federally
endangered Peninsular bighorn sheep rebound from the brink of
extinction. It’s the latest salvo in a fight over
whether, and to what extent, the park should prop up one
species threatened by climate change. New management has raised
concerns about the cost and possible futility of such
endeavors.
On Thursday, the Orange County Coastkeeper filed a complaint in
the Central District of California against Hixson Metal
Finishing, FPC Management, LLC and Reid Washbon alleging
violations of the Federal Water Pollution Control Act and Clean
Water Act. According to the complaint, the Orange County
Coastkeeper is a California nonprofit public benefit
corporation dedicated to the preservation, protection and
defense of the environment, wildlife and natural resources of
Orange County.
What if you had just enough water to spare to make a
life-or-death difference for vulnerable coho salmon or a
steelhead trout stranded in a drought-stricken stream? Federal
and state fish and wildlife officials hope there may be grape
growers or other landowners in key areas of the lower Russian
River watershed who might be willing to share some of their
water to support endangered coho and threatened steelhead. It
doesn’t take much.
The Yolo Bypass is one of two large flood bypasses in
California’s Central Valley that are examples of multi-benefit
floodplain projects (Figure 1; Serra-Llobet et al.,
2022). Originally constructed in the early 20th century
for flood control, up to 75% of the Sacramento River’s flood
flow can be diverted through a system of weirs into the Yolo
Bypass and away from nearby communities (Figure 2; Salcido,
2012; Sommer et al., 2001). During the dry season, floodplain
soils in the bypass support farming of seasonal crops (mostly
rice). Today, the bypass is also widely recognized for its
ecological benefits.
From its headwaters in the Sierra Nevada, the Feather River
flows some 3,600 feet downhill, where, in Oroville, it meets
the tallest dam in the nation. Its path shows exactly why
California geology is ideal for the production of hydropower.
It’s physics. The higher the mountains, the faster the water
falls. Hydropower dams capture this power and divert it through
spinning turbines in nearby powerhouses that activate
generators to produce electricity. But all this hydropower
comes at a cost.
Rivers in California’s Central Valley like to go their own way:
they expand, contract, meander and regenerate soil in the
process. The historic movement of rivers is what made Central
Valley soil so fertile. Naturally flowing rivers recharge and
save water for people and nature, providing habitat for many
species including four distinct runs of chinook salmon.
Before the early 20th century, the Sacramento River had one of
the biggest salmon runs in North America …
On Dec. 21, 2021, The Land Conservancy of San Luis Obispo
County completed three contiguous conservation easements on the
Attiyeh Ranch near Lake Nacimiento. The easements permanently
protect a whopping 7,682 acres of oak woodland, annual
grasslands, and chaparral, as well as significant freshwater
resources and wildlife habitat.
At California’s second biggest freshwater lake, the latest
fallout of drought is gruesome: dead fish in nearby stream beds
that have run dry. Some of the foot-long, silvery Clear Lake
hitch have been decapitated by racoons and other varmints,
which have had easy pickings of the beached minnow. The
grim sightings by Lake County and tribal crews surveying the
lake have prompted a rescue effort over the past week to save
hitch, a threatened species found only in this region.
California water regulators hosted a public forum on Wednesday
to collect comments about re-adopting drought emergency
regulations for Siskiyou County’s Scott and Shasta River
watersheds. … In response [to current drought conditions],
the California Department of Fish and Wildlife
is requesting the re-adoption of a 12-month drought
emergency regulation to protect salmon, steelhead and
other native fish.
How the Devil’s Hole pupfish has survived for centuries in a
spa-like cistern cloistered by a barren rock mountain in Death
Valley National Park remains a biological mystery. The world’s
rarest, most inbred fish clings to existence in the smallest
geographic range of any vertebrate: the shallow end of an
oxygen-deprived pool 10 feet wide, 70 feet long and more than
500 feet deep. In early 2013, its numbers plunged to 35, and
biologists feared the species long regarded as a symbol of the
desert conservation movement would be gone within a year.
State wildlife officials are urging the public to be aware of
increased bear activity as dry conditions and hot temperatures
persist in the region. The Arizona Game and Fish Department
says dry vegetation has reduced bears’ food supply which can
force them into urban areas. Residents are advised to make sure
pet food and bird seed are inaccessible to bears or other
animals and to bring trash cans inside until collection day.
Public developments on the California coast would be required
to capture carbon in wetlands or other natural systems under an
Assembly bill that calls for projects to add “blue carbon”
measures to their mitigation plans. Blue carbon refers to
coastal habitat such as wetlands, marshes, kelp forests and
eelgrass beds that capture and store carbon in soil, plant
matter and the sea floor. AB 2593, authored by
Assemblymember Boerner Horvath, D-Encinitas, would require
projects on public lands to compensate for greenhouse gas
emissions by building or contributing to blue carbon projects.
In a first-of-its-kind legal action, California is
interrogating the role of fossil fuel and chemical giants in
driving the plastics pollution crisis and deceiving consumers
about recycling. California Attorney General Rob Bonta (D) said
yesterday that the state is investigating Exxon Mobil Corp. and
other companies for “their role in causing and exacerbating”
plastics contamination. … “In California and across the
globe, we are seeing the catastrophic results of the fossil
fuel industry’s decades-long campaign of deception. Plastic
pollution is seeping into our waterways, poisoning our
environment, and blighting our landscapes,” said Bonta, a
Democrat, in a statement.
The [Tejon Ranch] company’s proposals promise a reprieve from
California’s existential crisis about its way of life,
suggesting that the environmental consequences of the state’s
notorious sprawl can be reformed with rooftop solar panels,
induction cooktops, electric cars, and careful bookkeeping.
… During the years of litigation surrounding FivePoint
Valencia, environmentalists scored a few rare wins. The
development had to reduce its footprint to protect the Santa
Clara River’s floodplain. It had to conserve land to protect
the unarmored threespine stickleback—an endangered fish that
lives in the river—and the San Fernando Valley spineflower, a
rare plant.
When it comes to wasteful, overpriced and ill-considered
proposals to address California’s water supply issues, it’s
hard to know where to start. But a good place would be the plan
to build a desalination plant on the Pacific coast at
Huntington Beach. … As I’ve reported in the past,
there isn’t much to recommend the Huntington Beach project. It
would seriously damage the marine coastal environment, produce
the costliest water of any source available and raise water
bills for residents and businesses. -Written by Michael Hiltzik, LA Times business
columnist.
Lake County’s drought conditions led this week to the need to
rescue hundreds of threatened native fish. Lake County Water
Resources staff and the California Department of Fish and
Wildlife, working alongside of Robinson Rancheria and
Habematolel Pomo tribal members, leapt to the rescue on
Thursday when it was reported that there were Clear Lake hitch
in an isolated pool in Adobe Creek near Soda Bay in Lakeport.
The hitch, a large minnow found only in Clear Lake and its
tributaries, has been a culturally important fish for the Pomo
tribes, which considered it a staple food.
Local watersheds in the Eel River Valley and Southern Humboldt
County will benefit from five grants recently awarded by the
McLean Foundation. Grant recipients are the Eel River Recovery
Project and Friends of the Van Duzen, the Salmonid Restoration
Federation, Mattole Restoration Council, Friends of the Eel
River, and Friends of the Lost Coast.
Meteorologists are monitoring the potential for a “triple-dip
La Niña,” an unusual resurgence of cooler-than-normal sea
surface temperatures in the eastern tropical Pacific. While
such a phenomenon might seem remote, La Niña plays an enormous
role in our weather stateside. In addition to helping juice up
tornado season in the spring, La Niña has been known to
supercharge Atlantic hurricane season when it sticks around
into the summer and fall. La Niña is back. Here’s what that
means.
A plan to release an additional 500,000 acre-feet of water from
Flaming Gorge reservoir is welcome news to biologists
conducting research to recover four species of endangered fish
in the Colorado River Basin. … The extra water set to
come out of Flaming Gorge reservoir in Wyoming during the next
12 months is part of a 2022 Drought Response Operations Plan
agreed on last week by the Upper Basin states — Colorado,
Wyoming, Utah and New Mexico. The water is intended to help
prop up low levels at Lake Powell.
California Attorney General Rob Bonta on Thursday announced a
major investigation into companies that manufacture plastics,
the first of its kind in the nation, saying that for 50 years
they have been engaged in potentially illegal business
practices by misleadingly claiming that plastics products are
recyclable, when most are not. Bonta said he issued subpoenas
to ExxonMobil, with other companies likely to follow, and said
society’s growing plastics pollution problem — particularly in
oceans, which are littered by trillions of tiny pieces of
plastic — is something they are legally liable for and should
be ordered to address.
A truck driver who law enforcement believes was driving under
the influence dumped 2,000 gallons of “hot asphalt binder” in a
California forest this week. … Officials from Six Rivers
National Forest said the trailer contained 2,000 gallons
of “hot asphalt binder,” which began seeping into the Smith
River. … A quick response by forest workers, Caltrans,
Del Norte County Office of Emergency Services and other
agencies minimized the spread of the chemicals. They believe
there are no impacts to water quality.
Citing California’s worsening drought conditions, Gov. Gavin
Newsom on Friday made a powerful new push for a controversial
$1.4 billion desalination plant on the state’s coastline. The
proposed oceanfront facility in Huntington Beach has been under
debate for more than 20 years, and its fate could set a course
for other desalination plants on the state’s coast. The
California Coastal Commission is scheduled to take a final vote
on the project in two weeks. … Newsom said a no
vote by the full commission to kill the project would be
“a big mistake, a big setback.”
California’s extreme drought over the last three years has been
intensified by hotter temperatures, putting strains on the
shrinking reserves in the state’s reservoirs. … Yet even
as the northern third of the MWD’s vast service area faces
unprecedented water restrictions, a different sort of struggle
is underway in Orange County, where a company’s plan to build a
large desalination plant is to face a critical vote next month
before the California Coastal Commission.
The science and data are clear. Southern California steelhead
are on the brink of extinction. Southern steelhead populations
have been decimated at the southern end of their native range,
plummeting from tens of thousands to a few hundred remaining
adults due to habitat loss, fragmentation, and degradation from
urbanization. On April 21, an important milestone was achieved
to prevent the irreversible loss of this iconic Southern
California fish species. The California Fish and Game
Commission unanimously voted that the state ESA listing of
Southern steelhead may be warranted.
Last summer, Siskiyou County’s recently appointed sheriff,
Jeremiah LaRue, released a video on YouTube to explain two
controversial new county groundwater laws. The drought was
severe that year, he said, and the “wasteful extraction” of
water for illegal cannabis cultivation was making it worse.
… The environmentalist rhetoric and talk of water policy
signaled a shift in how LaRue’s department policed the illicit
cannabis industry.
Critically endangered adult salmon are again swimming above a
century-old dam in this remote corner of far Northern
California in the shadow of the Mount Lassen volcano. But this
isn’t a habitat-restoration success story — at least not yet.
For the past two weeks, state and federal fisheries managers
have begun hauling the winter-run Chinook nearly 50 miles by
truck from the dangerously warming Sacramento River to a
stretch of the north fork of Battle Creek and releasing them, a
handful at a time, into the creek’s icy waters.
What does Slow Water mean? In our attempt to control water
we’re often trying to eradicate the slow phases and move it a
lot more quickly. We’re putting up levees so that it won’t
settle on floodplains. We’re filling in wetlands so that we can
build or farm on top of them. We’re cutting down mountain
forests that act as water towers, generating water and
releasing it slowly. In all of the cases I looked at, the water
detectives were trying to give water access to its slow phases
again, whether that meant restoring or protecting wetlands, or
reclaiming floodplains, or protecting wet meadows, or in a
city, creating something like bioswales.
Congressman Jared Huffman introduced a new bill this week that
aims to give land back to the Yurok Tribe. HR7581, known as the
Yurok Lands Act, would expand the Yurok reservation boundaries
and give the tribe more than 1,229 additional acres of U.S.
Forest Service land. … By reclaiming land, the Tribe
hopes to help keep local forests and salmon populations
healthy.
Germs are hitching rides around the world’s waterways on the
tiniest of rafts — microscopic plastic fibers from human
clothing and fishing nets — and contaminate the shellfish that
consume them, according to research published Tuesday by
scientists at the University of California, Davis. These
researchers hope to see further study on how the pathogens in
these contaminated fish affect the humans and other animals
eating them.
Growing up in Anaheim, the beach and the ocean served as a
place of solace for Orange County Coastkeeper Founder and
President Garry Brown, who created the nonprofit to help
protect the place he loves most. … In their mission to
protect water in Orange County, they’ve taken a stance on a
divisive issue affecting their community — whether the region
needs desalination, a costly, energy-intensive process that
uses reverse osmosis technology to remove salt from seawater to
make drinking water.
A coalition of water stakeholder organizations from across
California joined together to send a letter addressed to
Gov. Gavin Newsom and six key legislators requesting
action to address water issues. The nine page document dated
April 19, 2022 was signed by 18 organizations and entities
including the San Joaquin Valley Water Blueprint and 10
Southern California, four Bay Area and three trade groups. The
letter laid out the need to include a $6.5 billion
appropriation in the 2022-2023 General Fund budget to
strengthen statewide drought and flood resilience. -Written by Don Wright, a contributor to The San
Joaquin Valley Sun.
Onja Davidson Raoelison, a doctoral candidate in environmental
engineering at UCLA, has been working to keep waterways safe.
Her research and studies focus on green infrastructure and how
wildfires impact water systems…. Raoelison has been looking
at how biofilters can protect water from debris and toxic
pollutants such as heavy metals.
You could say that Orange Memorial Park in South San Francisco
is about to turn deep green. … [Colma Creek is] an
historic, natural waterway that was heavily cemented for flood
control in the early days of the area’s development. For
decades, the creek has carried runoff from the surrounding
watershed straight into San Francisco Bay, along with a
significant amount of trash. But that’s about to change.
If the recent attacks on California’s landmark environmental
law sound tired, that’s because they are. Ever since the
California Environmental Quality Act went into effect in 1970,
there have been calls to tweak, reform or completely throw it
out. … In Napa, where hillside forests are being razed for
vineyards, CEQA was used to limit the size of a massive winery
conversion project to save as many carbon-sequestering trees as
possible. -Written by John Buse, senior counsel for the
Center for Biological Diversity.
The state of California has released the final version of its
Pathways to 30×30 report. Here are five things to know about
the terrestrial conservation elements of this landmark
effort: 1. Freshwater Conservation The Pathways
document is explicit about the critical need to expand
protection of California’s rivers, streams, wetlands, and other
freshwater resources …
In this new series, our Communications Associate, Kara
Glenwright, sits down for conversations with the women on our
Conservation and Policy/Legal teams. Follow along as these
women share their own stories and experiences as women in
conservation and science at CalTrout.
The Salton Sea, located in Southern California, is a saline
terminal lake that has had many identities over the past
century or so. Since its reincarnation in 1905 due to lower
Colorado River flooding that partially refilled the Salton
Sink, it has been California’s largest lake by surface area,
covering approximately 350 square miles…. Yet with nearly 90%
of its inflow comprised of agricultural drainage waters from
the approximately 500,000 acres of irrigated farmland in the
Imperial Irrigation District (IID), and exposure to an
extremely arid climate that results in excessive evaporation
… the Sea’s natural attractions have faded as the lake has
become more polluted and nearly twice as saline as the
ocean….
For the first time in half a century, ocean-going fish will
soon be able to migrate up Alameda Creek to spawn, now that a
second fish ladder has been completed in the lower portion of
the creek in Fremont. Alameda County Water District and Alameda
County Flood Control District officials on Monday celebrated
the completion of the fish ladder, which was finished earlier
this month, according to Sharene Gonzales, a water district
spokesperson. The ladder, which consists of a series of
steadily elevating pools, allows migratory fish such as Chinook
salmon and threatened steelhead trout to get around human-made
barriers in the lower creek …
Over the past two centuries, 95% of the Central Valley’s
wetlands have been lost to development, landscaped out of
existence to satisfy the hunger of an urbanizing, growing
nation. But that’s only part of the picture. California’s
Central Valley extends far beyond what you can see from the
freeways bisecting the belly of the state to connect the
Redding to the Bay Area to Los Angeles. The region once boasted
one of the largest and most biologically diverse wetlands on
earth nourished by the mighty Sacramento and San Joaquin Rivers
…
Microplastics are a pathway for pathogens on land to reach the
ocean, with likely consequences for human and wildlife health,
according to a study from the University of California, Davis.
The study, published today in the journal Scientific Reports,
is the first to connect microplastics in the ocean with
land-based pathogens. It found that microplastics can make it
easier for disease-causing pathogens to concentrate in
plastic-contaminated areas of the ocean.
One of the most ambitious conservation efforts ever,
California’s 30×30 initiative aims to protect plant and animal
life across 30 percent of the state’s most critical land and
water by 2030. Gov. Gavin Newsom has described the plan as an
important step toward ensuring community well-being, equity,
and economic sustainability while staving off mega wildfires,
droughts, and other climate change-driven threats. Stanford
University experts have informed 30×30 through their
participation in public outreach sessions, meetings with the
plan’s leadership and a letter of support signed by faculty
members from all seven of the university’s schools.
Rather than planning for droughts and ensuring that minimum
water quality objectives are achieved in critically dry years,
the proposed voluntary agreement appears to be a “plan to fail”
to protect the Delta in future droughts. Droughts are a
fact of life in California, even as climate change is making
them worse. The Governor’s Water Resilience Portfolio
recognizes the need to improve drought preparedness, requiring
that the State to be able to protect fish and wildlife during a
six year drought …
A proposed California desalination plant that would produce 50
million gallons of drinking water per day failed a crucial
regulatory hurdle on Monday, possibly dooming a project that
had been promoted as a partial solution for sustained drought.
The staff of the California Coastal Commission recommended
denying approval of the Huntington Beach plant proposed by
Poseidon Water … [and] said the project was more
susceptible to sea-level rise than was understood when it was
first proposed more than two decades ago.
The White House Council on Environmental Quality has reversed
three key Trump administration changes that govern how federal
agencies implement the National Environmental Policy Act
(NEPA). The rule, published on April 20, 2022, finalizes what
the Council on Environmental Quality (CEQ) called “Phase One”
of their effort to review and revise the Trump administration’s
July 2020 overhaul of the NEPA regulations, and follows a
proposed rule that CEQ issued for public comments last fall.
In November 2021, salmon entering Putah Creek were part of a
large fish kill in the lower creek. The event took
everyone familiar with the creek by surprise and prevented
successful migration of the creek’s fall salmon. Only 4 or 5
adult Chinook salmon made it upstream to suitable spawning
habitat. The result was particularly tragic as it followed
on the heels of the restoration of a salmon run in the creek,
as well as habitat for other fishes.
Spirits live here. That’s what Paiute and Shoshone tribal
members say about the Owens Lake playa, an arid, eerily flat
expanse along the eastern Sierra Nevada range that is prone to
choking dust storms. It is best known as the focal point
of a historic feud that began in the early 1900s,
when Los Angeles city agents quietly bought up ranch lands and
water rights for an aqueduct to quench the thirst of the
growing metropolis 200 miles to the south.
No one was surprised by Thursday’s letter granting PG&E an
annual license to run the Potter Valley Project until April of
next year. And, while a last-minute mystery application did
provide a few moments of titillating speculation, the enigmatic
Antonio Manfredini failed to generate any real suspense. The
50-year license to operate the Potter Valley Project, which
diverts water from the Eel River into the east branch of the
Russian River to Lake Mendocino by way of a tunnel, a pair of
dams and reservoirs, and a small hydropower plant, expired on
April 14.
Northern California farmers use pumped river water during
freezing spring nights to coat the growing grapes with a
protective layer of ice, and without this protection there
could be significant losses to crops. That water, however,
comes from the homes of the hook-mouthed coho salmon and
the threatened steelhead trout. Once plentiful, the coho salmon
is now a protected species under threat (via NOAA Fisheries).
Salmon-Safe seeks to protect important species in California
and beyond, while still supporting the many brewery and winery
industries that need water to thrive.
The group “We Advocate Through Environmental Review” and the
Winnemem Wintu Tribe challenged the environmental impact report
prepared by the city [of Mt. Shasta] and Siskiyou County. They
argued county officials offered a misleading report and failed
to properly look at the impacts of the bottling plant on the
environment. The groups filed two lawsuits, one against the
city and one against the county.
The Delta Science Program is excited to release the 2022-2026
Science Action Agenda (SAA). Developed by and for the
Sacramento-San Joaquin Delta science community, the 2022-2026
SAA builds on the progress of the 2017-2021 iteration to
prioritize and align science actions to meet management needs,
foster collaboration and coordination, and guide science
funding. It will serve as a roadmap for the allocation and
integration of investments through research, time, and
resources.
A total of nine people have been arrested after an
investigation into a large suspected sturgeon poaching
operation along Sacramento Valley waterways. The California
Department of Fish and Wildlife says the investigation started
as two separate cases, but a connection between the suspects
led them to uncovering the larger operation.
Emily Tianshi has loved coming to Torrey Pines State Preserve
since she was young. The beach and preserve is one of the
very few places where its namesake grows. As a curious middle
schooler with an interest in biology, she became fascinated
with the rarely studied tree. “Because the pine is so rare,
nobody had studied its mechanisms before,” she says. “I would
observe that the Torrey Pine needles are able to condense water
from the marine layer that comes through the State Park and use
that to water itself in the midst of drought.”
Happy Earth Day. As you probably know, April 22 is a day set
aside for appreciating the environment and demonstrating
support for laws that protect it. … But it was a massive
oil spill in 1969 off the coast of Santa Barbara that
ultimately served as a catalyst for Earth Day…. At the
national level, Congress passed the Clean Air Act, the Clean
Water Act and the Endangered Species Act, and President Richard
M. Nixon created the Environmental Protection Agency.
The Sacramento River Settlement Contractors are currently
implementing another project on the Sacramento River just
downstream from Keswick Reservoir that will contribute to the
habitat targets established by the recently signed Voluntary
Agreements Memorandum of Understanding. The 2022 Keswick Gravel
Injection Project will provide much needed spawning habitat in
the upper Sacramento River for endangered winter-run Chinook
salmon.
Among the many complex arguments over water in California, one
particularly heated debate centers on whether the state should
seek more drinking water from a plentiful but expensive source:
the Pacific Ocean. The debate has reached a critical stage in
Huntington Beach, where Poseidon Water has been trying for more
than two decades to build one of the country’s largest
desalination plants. The California Coastal Commission is
scheduled to vote next month on whether to grant a permit to
build the plant.
To its side is the oldest fish counting station in
California, the Van Arsdale Fisheries Station, run by
the California Department of Fish and Game since 1922. The
station overlooks a fish ladder, built as part of the
agreement to allow construction of the Scott Dam, which allows
fish like salmon and trout to travel upriver to
spawn. Unfortunately, from the beginning it also
overlooked, and not in the scenic way, the needs of the
lamprey, a much-maligned fish that also needs access to the
Eel’s headwaters and unlike its salmonid cousins can’t swim up
a ladder.
According to the Environmental Protection Agency, the San Diego
River has long been listed as an impaired water body, but SDSU
researchers are working to fix it. … In another study,
SDSU environmental engineer Natalie Mladenov and her
team found that high levels of bacteria correlate with the
presence of caffeine and sucralose, found only in human
waste.
With historic droughts strangling the world, from California to
Africa, Senator Paul Simon’s book Tapped Out: Water: The Coming
Crisis and What We Can Do About it, is now available in
paperback and as an eBook published by Inprint Books. …
In Brazil, the current drought is one of the worst ever
recorded. … In Madagascar, drought has left hundreds of
thousands of people malnourished, pushing the
country to the edge of famine. In the last two
decades alone, the United Nations estimates drought has
affected 1.5 billion people and led to economic
losses of at least $124 billion.
A leading U.S. environmental conservation group has released
its annual list of the country’s most endangered rivers. The
Colorado River tops the list, but states across the nation must
address polluted, dry, and unhealthy rivers, according to the
list and accompanying report published today by American
Rivers.
The 100-year-old Potter Valley Project consists of two dams
along Northern California’s Eel River. The upstream Scott Dam
blocks salmon and steelhead from reaching prime spawning
grounds, according to Alicia Hamann, the director of Friends of
Eel River. Both fish are threatened under the Endangered
Species Act. Friends of the Eel River are one of a handful of
environmental groups planning to sue PG&E to seek
protections for these dwindling fish populations.
Concerns are being raised over what the drought might be doing
to an ancient salmon run that goes through the heart of Silicon
Valley. Roger Castillo doesn’t look after the rivers and
streams and their wildlife in Silicon Valley because it’s his
job. He does it because he loves it. … The mostly
self-taught citizen-naturalist is a former truck mechanic who
just discovered thriving schools of Chinook salmon fry in Los
Gatos Creek. But because of reduced water flows due to the
drought, they’re likely to become trapped in pools of warm
water upstream with no way to swim out to sea when they mature.
A Native American tribe in Oregon said Tuesday it is assessing
its legal options after learning the U.S. government plans to
release water from a federally operated reservoir to downstream
farmers along the Oregon-California border amid a historic
drought. Even limited irrigation for the farmers who use
Klamath River water on about 300 square miles of crops puts two
critically endangered fish species in peril of extinction
because the water withdrawals come at the height of spawning
season, The Klamath Tribes said.
Members of the Klamath Tribal community gathered Friday morning
in the parking lot next to the headgates to protest the Bureau
of Reclamation’s decision to release water from the lake in
apparent violation of Endangered Species Act requirements for
the fish the tribe calls C’waam and Koptu (Lost River and
shortnose suckers), and to call for solutions to the basin’s
decades-long water crisis.
Growing up in a Northern Californian fishing town, Nate
Mantua’s family owned a business connected to the local salmon
fishing industry. When one of the worst El Niño events ever
recorded hit the West Coast in 1982 and 1983, the salmon
fishery his family relied on suffered. Nate would go on to
study how to predict El Niño events in graduate school, years
later. Now he works to understand the impacts of climate
change. Nate leads a team of salmon ecologists, biologists,
freshwater and ocean experts at NOAA Fisheries’ Southwest
Fisheries Science Center.
[P]iles of single-use plastics that can’t easily be recycled,
pollute roadsides and waterways and add to the garbage that
clogs landfills. In November, Californians may get a chance to
shrink that waste. An initiative designed to reduce single-use
plastics and polystyrene food containers will be on the ballot,
a move by environmentalists to bypass the Legislature, where
such measures have repeatedly failed in the face of industry
lobbying.
A coalition of fishery groups has formally notified PG&E
that it plans to file suit under the Endangered Species Act,
alleging the continued injury to once abundant federally
protected salmon and steelhead trout as a result of operations
at the utility’s aging Potter Valley powerhouse. The legal
maneuver is part of an effort to expedite removal of Scott and
Cape Horn dams, which pose a threat to vulnerable fish species
in the Eel River and block access to hundreds of miles of prime
habitat upstream.
Between vast almond orchards and dairy pastures in the heart of
California’s farm country sits a property being redesigned to
look like it did 150 years ago, before levees restricted the
flow of rivers that weave across the landscape. The 2,100 acres
(1,100 hectares) at the confluence of the Tuolumne and San
Joaquin rivers in the state’s Central Valley are being reverted
to a floodplain.
Not only does the proposed Bay-Delta voluntary agreement wholly
fail to provide the water that the environment needs, but even
the woefully inadequate flows and the habitat restoration
proposed in the VA would largely come from other water users
and taxpayers, rather than the water districts that signed the
MOU. … [P]art of the funding supposedly coming from
water districts simply redirects existing fees they are
required to pay under the 1992 Central Valley Project
Improvement Act ($10M/year).
Entering a third year of drought, the once-vast Tule Lake, a
vestige of the area’s volcanic past and today a federally
protected wetland, is shriveling up. Its floor is mostly
cracked mud and tumbleweed. By summer, the lake is expected to
run completely dry, a historic first for the region’s signature
landmark and the latest chapter in a broader, escalating water
war.
The Colorado River is the epicenter of the nation’s water and
climate crisis, according to an annual report from
the conservation group American Rivers that ranked the waterway
the country’s most endangered. … More than 20 years of
record-breaking climate change-driven drought has
brought the river and reservoirs Lake Powell and Lake Mead to
record lows. Last month, Lake Powell dropped below a
critical threshold of 3,525 feet for the first time — a
number the states and federal government have worked to
avoid to keep enough water in the reservoir for continued
hydropower production.
With high biodiversity and rich farmland, San Diego County is
exploring ways to put the region’s land to use to cut carbon
emissions. In an online public workshop Thursday, county
officials explained ways to expand the use of wetlands,
marshes, forests and agricultural lands to capture and store
carbon through the county’s Regional Decarbonization
Framework.
It’s the proverbial star of the show at Joshua Tree National
Park, and while Joshua Trees look peculiar, with ragged
scraggly limbs, they’re actually quite special. … But
[Dr. Cameron Barrows at UC Riverside] said Joshua Trees
are starting to disappear due to climate change.
… Barrows said due to climate change, many have stopped
reproducing.
As our planet wobbles toward its 52nd Earth Day on Friday,
April 22, the global medical report is … not great. This month,
the U.N. Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change warned that
if we don’t stop pouring carbon dioxide into the atmosphere
ASAP, we’ll soon be living in hell. California had its driest
first three months of the year in recorded history. Antarctic
ice shelves are melting before our eyes. Three new books
explore the perilous realities of life on Earth in 2022.
The Yurok Tribe and Redwood National Park and State Parks will
soon release the first four California condors to take flight
in the heart of the bird’s former range since 1892.
… Comprised of biologists and technicians from the Yurok
Tribe and Redwood National and State Parks, the Northern
California Condor Restoration Program will collaboratively
manage the flock from a newly constructed condor release and
management facility near the Klamath River.
Despite being the largest estuary on the West Coast and
supporting both a highly diverse ecosystem and a multi-billion
dollar economy, the San Francisco Bay Estuary was not getting
its fair share of federal funding for restoration, according to
local lawmakers and environmental organizations. That changed
this year after Congress and President Joe Biden approved more
than $50 million in funding to the U.S. Environmental
Protection Agency for projects to restore lost wetlands,
improve water quality, address pollution and bolster sea-level
rise defenses throughout San Francisco Bay.
Biologists have designed a variety
of unique experiments in the past decade to demonstrate the
benefits that floodplains provide for small fish. Tracking
studies have used acoustic tags to show that chinook salmon
smolts with access to inundated fields are more likely than their
river-bound cohorts to reach the Pacific Ocean. This is because
the richness of floodplains offers a vital buffet of nourishment
on which young salmon can capitalize, supercharging their growth
and leading to bigger, stronger smolts.
Water is flowing once again
to the Colorado River’s delta in Mexico, a vast region that
was once a natural splendor before the iconic Western river was
dammed and diverted at the turn of the last century, essentially
turning the delta into a desert.
In 2012, the idea emerged that water could be intentionally sent
down the river to inundate the delta floodplain and regenerate
native cottonwood and willow trees, even in an overallocated
river system. Ultimately, dedicated flows of river water were
brokered under cooperative
efforts by the U.S. and Mexican governments.
State work to improve wildlife habitat and tamp down dust at California’s ailing Salton Sea is finally moving forward. Now the sea may be on the verge of getting the vital ingredient needed to supercharge those restoration efforts – money.
The shrinking desert lake has long been a trouble spot beset by rising salinity and unhealthy, lung-irritating dust blowing from its increasingly exposed bed. It shadows discussions of how to address the Colorado River’s two-decade-long drought because of its connection to the system. The lake is a festering health hazard to nearby residents, many of them impoverished, who struggle with elevated asthma risk as dust rises from the sea’s receding shoreline.
This tour guided participants on a virtual exploration of the Sacramento River and its tributaries and learn about the issues associated with a key source for the state’s water supply.
All together, the river and its tributaries supply 35 percent of California’s water and feed into two major projects: the State Water Project and the federal Central Valley Project.
Radically transformed from its ancient origin as a vast tidal-influenced freshwater marsh, the Sacramento-San Joaquin Delta ecosystem is in constant flux, influenced by factors within the estuary itself and the massive watersheds that drain though it into the Pacific Ocean.
Lately, however, scientists say the rate of change has kicked into overdrive, fueled in part by climate change, and is limiting the ability of science and Delta water managers to keep up. The rapid pace of upheaval demands a new way of conducting science and managing water in the troubled estuary.
Out of sight and out of mind to most
people, the Salton Sea in California’s far southeast corner has
challenged policymakers and local agencies alike to save the
desert lake from becoming a fetid, hyper-saline water body
inhospitable to wildlife and surrounded by clouds of choking
dust.
The sea’s problems stretch beyond its boundaries in Imperial and
Riverside counties and threaten to undermine multistate
management of the Colorado River. A 2019 Drought Contingency Plan for the
Lower Colorado River Basin was briefly stalled when the Imperial
Irrigation District, holding the river’s largest water
allocation, balked at participating in the plan because, the
district said, it ignored the problems of the Salton Sea.
Deep, throaty cadenced calls —
sounding like an off-key bassoon — echo over the grasslands,
farmers’ fields and wetlands starting in late September of each
year. They mark the annual return of sandhill cranes to the
Cosumnes River Preserve,
46,000 acres located 20 miles south of Sacramento on the edge of
the Sacramento-San Joaquin Delta.
High in the headwaters of the Colorado River, around the hamlet of Kremmling, Colorado, generations of families have made ranching and farming a way of life, their hay fields and cattle sustained by the river’s flow. But as more water was pulled from the river and sent over the Continental Divide to meet the needs of Denver and other cities on the Front Range, less was left behind to meet the needs of ranchers and fish.
“What used to be a very large river that inundated the land has really become a trickle,” said Mely Whiting, Colorado counsel for Trout Unlimited. “We estimate that 70 percent of the flow on an annual average goes across the Continental Divide and never comes back.”
One of California Gov. Gavin
Newsom’s first actions after taking office was to appoint Wade
Crowfoot as Natural Resources Agency secretary. Then, within
weeks, the governor laid out an ambitious water agenda that
Crowfoot, 45, is now charged with executing.
That agenda includes the governor’s desire for a “fresh approach”
on water, scaling back the conveyance plan in the Sacramento-San
Joaquin Delta and calling for more water recycling, expanded
floodplains in the Central Valley and more groundwater recharge.
Bruce Babbitt, the former Arizona
governor and secretary of the Interior, has been a thoughtful,
provocative and sometimes forceful voice in some of the most
high-profile water conflicts over the last 40 years, including
groundwater management in Arizona and the reduction of
California’s take of the Colorado River. In 2016, former
California Gov. Jerry Brown named Babbitt as a special adviser to
work on matters relating to the Sacramento-San Joaquin Delta and
the Delta tunnels plan.
For the bulk of her career, Jayne
Harkins has devoted her energy to issues associated with the
management of the Colorado River, both with the U.S. Bureau of
Reclamation and with the Colorado River Commission of Nevada.
Now her career is taking a different direction. Harkins, 58, was
appointed by President Trump last August to take the helm of the
United States section of the U.S.-Mexico agency that oversees
myriad water matters between the two countries as they seek to
sustainably manage the supply and water quality of the Colorado
River, including its once-thriving Delta in Mexico, and other
rivers the two countries share. She is the first woman to be
named the U.S. Commissioner of the International Boundary and
Water Commission for either the United States or Mexico in the
commission’s 129-year history.
The growing leadership of women in water. The Colorado River’s persistent drought and efforts to sign off on a plan to avert worse shortfalls of water from the river. And in California’s Central Valley, promising solutions to vexing water resource challenges.
These were among the topics that Western Water news explored in 2018.
We’re already planning a full slate of stories for 2019. You can sign up here to be alerted when new stories are published. In the meantime, take a look at what we dove into in 2018:
In the universe of California water, Tim Quinn is a professor emeritus. Quinn has seen — and been a key player in — a lot of major California water issues since he began his water career 40 years ago as a young economist with the Rand Corporation, then later as deputy general manager with the Metropolitan Water District of Southern California, and finally as executive director of the Association of California Water Agencies. In December, the 66-year-old will retire from ACWA.
In 1983, a landmark California Supreme Court ruling extended the public trust doctrine to tributary creeks that feed Mono Lake, which is a navigable water body even though the creeks themselves were not. The ruling marked a dramatic shift in water law and forced Los Angeles to cut back its take of water from those creeks in the Eastern Sierra to preserve the lake.
Now, a state appellate court has for the first time extended that same public trust doctrine to groundwater that feeds a navigable river, in this case the Scott River flowing through a picturesque valley of farms and alfalfa in Siskiyou County in the northern reaches of California.
There’s going to be a new governor
in California next year – and a host of challenges both old and
new involving the state’s most vital natural resource, water.
So what should be the next governor’s water priorities?
That was one of the questions put to more than 150 participants
during a wrap-up session at the end of the Water Education
Foundation’s Sept. 20 Water Summit in Sacramento.
Water means life for all the Grand Canyon’s inhabitants, including the many varieties of insects that are a foundation of the ecosystem’s food web. But hydropower operations upstream on the Colorado River at Glen Canyon Dam, in Northern Arizona near the Utah border, disrupt the natural pace of insect reproduction as the river rises and falls, sometimes dramatically. Eggs deposited at the river’s edge are often left high and dry and their loss directly affects available food for endangered fish such as the humpback chub.
An hour’s drive north of Sacramento sits a picture-perfect valley hugging the eastern foothills of Northern California’s Coast Range, with golden hills framing grasslands mostly used for cattle grazing.
Back in the late 1800s, pioneer John Sites built his ranch there and a small township, now gone, bore his name. Today, the community of a handful of families and ranchers still maintains a proud heritage.
Farmers in the Central Valley are broiling about California’s plan to increase flows in the Sacramento and San Joaquin river systems to help struggling salmon runs avoid extinction. But in one corner of the fertile breadbasket, River Garden Farms is taking part in some extraordinary efforts to provide the embattled fish with refuge from predators and enough food to eat.
And while there is no direct benefit to one farm’s voluntary actions, the belief is what’s good for the fish is good for the farmers.
For more than 100 years, invasive
species have made the Sacramento-San Joaquin Delta their home,
disrupting the ecosystem and costing millions of dollars annually
in remediation.
The latest invader is the nutria, a large rodent native to South
America that causes concern because of its propensity to devour
every bit of vegetation in sight and destabilize levees by
burrowing into them. Wildlife officials are trapping the animal
and trying to learn the extent of its infestation.
Deep, throaty cadenced calls —
sounding like an off-key bassoon — echo over the grasslands,
farmers’ fields and wetlands starting in late September of each
year. They mark the annual return of sandhill cranes to the
Cosumnes River Preserve,
46,000 acres located 20 miles south of Sacramento on the edge of
the Sacramento-San Joaquin Delta.
As we continue forging ahead in 2018
with our online version of Western Water after 40 years
as a print magazine, we turned our attention to a topic that also
got its start this year: recreational marijuana as a legal use.
State regulators, in the last few years, already had been beefing
up their workforce to tackle the glut in marijuana crops and
combat their impacts to water quality and supply for people, fish
and farming downstream. Thus, even if these impacts were perhaps
unbeknownst to the majority of Californians who approved
Proposition 64 in 2016, we thought it important to see if
anything new had evolved from a water perspective now that
marijuana was legal.
California voters may experience a sense of déjà vu this year when they are asked twice in the same year to consider water bonds — one in June, the other headed to the November ballot.
Both tackle a variety of water issues, from helping disadvantaged communities get clean drinking water to making flood management improvements. But they avoid more controversial proposals, such as new surface storage, and they propose to do some very different things to appeal to different constituencies.
Along the banks of the
Sacramento-San Joaquin Delta in Oakley, about 50 miles southwest
of Sacramento, is a park that harkens back to the days when the
Delta lured Native Americans, Spanish explorers, French fur
trappers, and later farmers to its abundant wildlife and rich
soil.
That historical Delta was an enormous marsh linked to the two
freshwater rivers entering from the north and south, and tidal
flows coming from the San Francisco Bay. After the Gold Rush,
settlers began building levees and farms, changing the landscape
and altering the habitat.
Despite the heat that often
accompanies debates over setting aside water for the environment,
there are instances where California stakeholders have forged
agreements to provide guaranteed water for fish. Here are two
examples cited by the Public Policy Institute of California in
its report arguing for an environmental water right.
Does California need to revamp the way in which water is dedicated to the environment to better protect fish and the ecosystem at large? In the hypersensitive world of California water, where differences over who gets what can result in epic legislative and legal battles, the idea sparks a combination of fear, uncertainty and promise.
Saying that the way California manages water for the environment “isn’t working for anyone,” the Public Policy Institute of California (PPIC) shook things up late last year by proposing a redesigned regulatory system featuring what they described as water ecosystem plans and water budgets with allocations set aside for the environment.
This tour explored the Sacramento River and its tributaries
through a scenic landscape as participants learned about the
issues associated with a key source for the state’s water supply.
All together, the river and its tributaries supply 35 percent of
California’s water and feed into two major projects: the State
Water Project and the federal Central Valley Project. Tour
participants got an on-site update of repair efforts on the
Oroville Dam spillway.
Estuaries are places where fresh and
salt water mix, usually at the point where a river enters the
ocean. They are the meeting point between riverine environments
and the sea, with a combination of tides, waves, salinity, fresh
water flow and sediment. The constant churning means there are
elevated levels of nutrients, making estuaries highly productive
natural habitats.
Zooplankton, which are floating
aquatic microorganisms too small and weak to swim against
currents, are are important food sources for many fish species in
the Delta such as salmon, sturgeon and Delta smelt.
A tributary is a river or stream
that enters a larger body of water, especially a lake or river.
The receiving water into which a tributary
feeds is called the “mainstem,” and the point where they come
together is referred to as the “confluence.”
With a holding capacity of more than 260 billion gallons, Diamond
Valley Lake is
Southern California’s largest reservoir. It sits about 90
miles southeast of Los Angeles and just west of Hemet in
Riverside County where it was built in 2000. The offstream
reservoir was created by three large dams that connect the surrounding
hills, costing around $1.9 billion and doubling the region’s
water storage capacity.
Headwaters are the source of a
stream or river. They are located at the furthest point from
where the water body empties or merges with
another. Two-thirds of California’s surface water supply
originates in these mountainous and typically forested regions.
In wet years, dry years and every type of water year in between,
the daily intrusion and retreat of salinity in the Sacramento-San
Joaquin Delta is a constant pattern.
The cycle of ebb and flood is the defining nature of an estuary
and prior to its transformation into an agricultural tract in
the mid-19th century, the Delta was a freshwater marsh with
plants, birds, fish and wildlife that thrived on the edge of the
saltwater/freshwater interface.
This 28-page report describes the watersheds of the Sierra Nevada
region and details their importance to California’s overall water
picture. It describes the region’s issues and challenges,
including healthy forests, catastrophic fire, recreational
impacts, climate change, development and land use.
The report also discusses the importance of protecting and
restoring watersheds in order to retain water quality and enhance
quantity. Examples and case studies are included.
20-minute version of the 2012 documentary The Klamath Basin: A
Restoration for the Ages. This DVD is ideal for showing at
community forums and speaking engagements to help the public
understand the complex issues related to complex water management
disputes in the Klamath River Basin. Narrated by actress Frances
Fisher.
For over a century, the Klamath River Basin along the Oregon and
California border has faced complex water management disputes. As
relayed in this 2012, 60-minute public television documentary
narrated by actress Frances Fisher, the water interests range
from the Tribes near the river, to energy producer PacifiCorp,
farmers, municipalities, commercial fishermen, environmentalists
– all bearing legitimate arguments for how to manage the water.
After years of fighting, a groundbreaking compromise may soon
settle the battles with two epic agreements that hold the promise
of peace and fish for the watershed. View an excerpt from the
documentary here.
This 25-minute documentary-style DVD, developed in partnership
with the California Department of Water Resources, provides an
excellent overview of climate change and how it is already
affecting California. The DVD also explains what scientists
anticipate in the future related to sea level rise and
precipitation/runoff changes and explores the efforts that are
underway to plan and adapt to climate.
30-minute DVD that traces the history of the U.S. Bureau of
Reclamation and its role in the development of the West. Includes
extensive historic footage of farming and the construction of
dams and other water projects, and discusses historic and modern
day issues.
California’s little-known New River has been called one of North
America’s most polluted. A closer look reveals the New River is
full of ironic twists: its pollution has long defied cleanup, yet
even in its degraded condition, the river is important to the
border economies of Mexicali and the Imperial Valley and a
lifeline that helps sustain the fragile Salton Sea ecosystem.
Now, after decades of inertia on its pollution problems, the New
River has emerged as an important test of binational cooperation
on border water issues. These issues were profiled in the 2004
PBS documentary Two Sides of a River.
This beautiful 24×36 inch poster, suitable for framing, features
a map of the San Joaquin River. The map text focuses on the San
Joaquin River Restoration Program, which aims to restore flows
and populations of Chinook salmon to the river below Friant Dam
to its confluence with the Merced River. The text discusses the
history of the program, its goals and ongoing challenges with
implementation.
This beautiful 24×36 inch poster, suitable for framing, displays
the rivers, lakes and reservoirs, irrigated farmland, urban areas
and Indian reservations within the Klamath River Watershed. The
map text explains the many issues facing this vast,
15,000-square-mile watershed, including fish restoration;
agricultural water use; and wetlands. Also included are
descriptions of the separate, but linked, Klamath Basin
Restoration Agreement and the Klamath Hydroelectric Agreement,
and the next steps associated with those agreements. Development
of the map was funded by a grant from the U.S. Fish and Wildlife
Service.
A companion to the Truckee River Basin Map poster, this 24×36
inch poster, suitable for framing, explores the Carson River, and
its link to the Truckee River. The map includes Lahontan Dam and
Reservoir, the Carson Sink, and the farming areas in the basin.
Map text discusses the region’s hydrology and geography, the
Newlands Project, land and water use within the basin and
wetlands. Development of the map was funded by a grant from the
U.S. Bureau of Reclamation Mid-Pacific Region, Lahontan Basin
Area Office.
This 24×36 inch poster, suitable for framing, explains how
non-native invasive animals can alter the natural ecosystem,
leading to the demise of native animals. “Unwelcome Visitors”
features photos and information on four such species – including
the zerbra mussel – and explains the environmental and economic
threats posed by these species.
The 28-page Layperson’s Guide to
Water Rights Law, recognized as the most thorough explanation of
California water rights law available to non-lawyers, traces the
authority for water flowing in a stream or reservoir, from a
faucet or into an irrigation ditch through the complex web of
California water rights.
The 24-page Layperson’s Guide to the Delta explores the competing
uses and demands on California’s Sacramento-San Joaquin Delta.
Included in the guide are sections on the history of the Delta,
its role in the state’s water system, and its many complex issues
with sections on water quality, levees, salinity and agricultural
drainage, fish and wildlife, and water distribution.
As part of the historic Colorado River Delta, the Salton Sea
regularly filled and dried for thousands of years due to its
elevation of 237 feet below sea level.
The most recent version of the Salton Sea was formed in 1905 when
the Colorado River broke
through a series of dikes and flooded the seabed for two years,
creating California’s largest inland body of water. The
Salton Sea, which is saltier than the Pacific Ocean, includes 130
miles of shoreline and is larger than Lake Tahoe.
The Pacific Flyway is one of four
major North American migration routes for birds, especially
waterfowl, and extends from Alaska and Canada, through
California, to Mexico and South America. Each year, birds follow
ancestral patterns as they travel the flyway on their annual
north-south migration. Along the way, they need stopover sites
such as wetlands with suitable habitat and food supplies. In
California, 90 percent of historic wetlands have been lost.
The construction of Glen Canyon Dam in 1964 created Lake Powell.
Both are located in north-central Arizona near the Utah border.
Lake Powell acts as a holding tank for outflow from the Colorado
River Upper Basin States: Colorado, New Mexico, Utah and Wyoming.
The water stored in Lake Powell is used for recreation, power
generation and delivering water to the Lower Basin states of
California, Arizona, and Nevada.
This issue of Western Water looks at the BDCP and the
Coalition to Support Delta Projects, issues that are aimed at
improving the health and safety of the Delta while solidifying
California’s long-term water supply reliability.
This printed issue of Western Water examines the issues
associated with the State Water Board’s proposed revision of the
water quality Bay-Delta Plan, most notably the question of
whether additional flows are needed for the system, and how they
might be provided.
This printed issue of Western Water examines science –
the answers it can provide to help guide management decisions in
the Delta and the inherent uncertainty it holds that can make
moving forward such a tenuous task.
This printed issue of Western Water provides an overview of the
idea of a dual conveyance facility, including questions
surrounding its cost, operation and governance
This printed copy of Western Water examines the native salmon and
trout dilemma – the extent of the crisis, its potential impact on
water deliveries and the lengths to which combined efforts can
help restore threatened and endangered species.