In a state of 38 million people, we have a water system designed for half that number, It's time to solve this problem with a comprehensive water solution that includes building dams, improving underground storage and undertaking extreme conservation measures. This problem won't get solved by ignoring it.
In today's lead editorial, The Fresno Bee's editorial board give its take on the state's water issue and what stands in the way of a comprehensive solution. Click here to read the editorial.
Let us begin with the obvious....too darn many people are using up water of which none returns to the aquiver. Slice it as you may, the Central Valley is a semi-arid region with not enough precipitation to seasonally replenish the aquiver, which once was plentiful, but has been overused. I had 57 years to observe. Less than half of a century ago the status quo was growing things. Orchards, fields, track farming etc.. A great deal of the water used for irrigation percolated back into the underground aquiver.
And then came the developers and after them hundreds of thousands non-ag but residential water users. I knew the son of a local mega-grower. He told me that building homes was more profitable than growing peaches. And now there is devil to be paid. Having closely observed the underground aquiver map , Clovis made some time back, demonstrated clearly the upsetting of the water use - water renewal ratio. Which was not perfect, but with continued predominately ag use, it would have taken much much longer to exhaust the aquiver or maybe never. But with Los Angeles (type) density of residential development on the ag land accelerated the depletion in progress. And no dams are going to turn this semi -arid zone into a temperate zone. Dam building may create a few jobs for a while, but also more residential development. And what after the dams??????The Pacific Northwest is not going to send their water to Fresno....take my word for it. I thought that LA sucking up the Sierra rivers and streams would have taught us a lesson. And so much for my two cents worth.
And how are we going to pay for this?The employee unions and legislature have sucked us dry(pardon the pun)and I don't think legalizing weed and future lottery sales are going to get it done...Someday when we are all thirsting for just a taste of water on our tongues...we'll remember the times we flushed the toilet unnecessarily or overwatered our begonias...or let the unions and environmentalists set our priorities and spend all our damn(parden the pun)money.
Ah Jim? Just wondering why you described the $33 million in stimulus spending as "appreciated" when it did nothing to promote your proposed trilogy of dams, waterbanks or conservation? Did you read Reclamation's description of the projects? They provide taxpayer money to build groundwater-depleting wells which will only delay a "solution." While I'm sure the folks in Westlands appreciate receiving gifts of more than $15,000 per "family farm," I'm not so sure I appreiciate having to pay for it. I am equally sure that I do not appreciate those who forgot to send me my check for $15,000.
The two cent worth soliloquy continued:
Since the major cause for the vanishing water supply in the dry inland valley's of California is too many people for the available resources, it is high time for the powers that be to develop a backbone and start with extensive residential building moratoriums and better protection and conservation of arable farmland. The powers that be, from the Nation's Capital down to rural hamlets impose all sorts of moratoriums upon the citizenry; so an argument of constitutionality hardly enters into it. That's for the High Courts to sort out.
The developers have run the show long enough, and see what it got us. An overpopulation left behind by the developers who took their profit and moved on to greener pastures ...literally...to pave those over. We need separate drinking water and use water supplies on a large scale. The know-how is not lacking, only the will to put up the money. Nothing wrong with use-water storage, but dams next to dams is a fool's errand as has been pointed out by everyone who does not advocate band aid approaches and solutions. We need the will and we need to put up the money. And this concludes my (by now) 4 cents worth.
Since California is not an island in the sky but is hooked to the rest of the USA, this digressing from the nuclear topic (California water) into human kind is forgivable.
I am sure most of us have read the shocking report about the "Texas sized...Great Pacific Garbage Patch...a massive vortex of floating garbage trash." We may have to forget about desalination of ocean water as a significant water supply. Humans are the only species on earth who are collectively nuts.
Most highly developed animal species stops breeding when there are too many of them for the available resource essential to the survival of the species. We humans invent all sorts of things to enhance and increase sexual activity which results in more of us being around using up dwindling resources.
The animal world is not depositing toxic substances into the environment which have been concocted and produced in laboratories and factories. Animal pollution is nearly 100% biodegradable and or reversible. I see it in these very simple terms...we are using good resources to produce bad resources...and that's us, the crown of the creation. Ha! And this concludes the third and last installment of talking to myself on the given topic.
...water meters.
folks having to pay for water, (even nominal fees) will cut down waste significantly.
You'll be amazed at how much water is really there when it's not just used unbridled for 'free.'
Years of drought on the Colorado River, and below-normal rainfall and snowpack in the Sierra Nevada mountains, combined with environmental restrictions on pumping water, have severely reduced the region’s water supply. http://tr.im/vRRx As a result, we are currently heading into Mandatory Conservation. What this means is that restrictions or fines on water usage could be imposed in order to address our water shortage. Therefore we need to make a conscious effort to reduce and minimize our water usage. Easy things we can do to help save water include fixing leaky sprinklers, installing water efficient shower heads, toilets and sprinklers etc. Check out all the tips on the site and pass it on to fellow Southern Californians! http://tr.im/vRRP
The reported loss to the city about $3.4 million. RE: "Homebuilders get break on city's fees" (Fresno Bee. Aug. 9). (Current) Council President Cynthia Sterling finds it essential to keep some jobs going. Is she and the Council still crying about the shortage of water? New subdivisions (about a thousand ? homes) are just going to additionally deplete the water supply. What we need is building moratoriums not more building. We are just shooting ourselves in the foot. And additional dams are not going to alleviate the increased non-ag water overdraft. They call it a rejuvenated construction industry...could it turn out to be a rejuvenated Operation Rezone as well? Mr. Rezone (himself) is again a big shot with one of the biggest local builders. Obviously I broke my word on no more comment on the subject. But for the love of Michael, don't let City Hall take us to the point of no return.
How about charging more for water and let the market take care of things. Charge enough and there won't be a shortage, guarenteed. The price for agricultural water has been heavily subsidized for many years. Let the price go up and have people compete for the resource and things should settle out without much difficulty. As for water from the pacific northwest, try paying for the aquaducts, pumps, and reservoirs. Also pay the current owners of the water. It the full cost of a new water supply system is paid by the consumers, it will not be economical.
Conservation crop rotation is growing crops in a recurring sequence on the same field. It applies to all land where crops are grown. I found that some Old World small family farm acreage is left fallow every third year. "when a farmer chooses not to use their water allotment, they should not loose the right to obtain their water allotment for the next year." Right! But it sells a lot of chemical fertilizer, soil additives and chemical pesticides. An older farmer in Italy explained it to me: "Rich fathers but poor sons."
Mark, It feels like I have been taken out of mothballs. Aug 6, that's a month ago.
Mark-
Excellent points.
Allow me to add a couple benefits to your comments. First, as the price goes up not only will usage go down, but interest will increase in alternative water technologies and we will move to a more broad-based system. I don't know what that will be, but am confident that as long as we have some semblance of a free market a solution will emerge. Second, as crop production decreases the amount of agricultural surplus should also diminish, therebye reducing the need for ag subsidies.
The dowside to this re-balancing process is that the changes that it brings will likely be a nuisance to some and, if fully implemented, the money previously paid for subsidies will not likely make its way back to taxpayers and will be spent on more worthless government programs.
I drive tens of thousands of miles through the same sections of westside farms every year. I don't ever remember seeing one crop fail, perhaps damaged by hail or rain, but not due to any process you describe. It is amazing how land is utilzed, I suppose we should rotate it to pine trees so bark beetles can destroy the whole forest while we watch, instead of harvest, the whole event scientifically. Then we can watch it burn to improve the air quality to the point we no longer can have winter fires in our homes. Yes we subsidize water to grow food, why is that a problem? Taxpayers have been subsidizing a bunch of reproducing, non productive, dope addicted, rotating couch potatoes for thirty years.
"I suppose we should rotate it to pine trees so bark beetles can destroy the whole forest while we watch, instead of harvest, the whole event scientifically. Then we can watch it burn to improve the air quality to the point we no longer can have winter fires in our homes. " Is Bart trying to be funny? No farmer is laughing.
(KANSAS RURAL CENTER SUSTAINABLE AGRICULTURE MANAGMENT GUIDES.)
"Crop rotations are fundamental to sustainable cropping systems. A well-designed crop rotation creates farm diversity and improves soil conditions and fertility. Unfortunately, it is common for fields to remain in the same crop for three or more years. In spite of the importance such as alfalfa or clover as a green manure crop for many years.
ALLTOUGH WIDELY ADVOCATED FOR CENTURIES; the disciplined use of good crop rotations was never widely practiced in American agriculture. But the changing character of today's farming - the high cost of off-farm inputs, the growing incidence of pesticide and fertilizer contamination of water, the increasing resistance of certain weeds and insects to pesticides, soil conservation requirements for farm programs, and surplus productionof major crops - points to the need for a renewed effort to adopt rotation-based farming systems.
Rotations are also an important management tool Rotations build the foundation for integrated weed management to reduce herbicide costs. Many agricultural researchers have outlined the benefits of crop rotation. The rotation system must be tailored to suit the particular farm and farmer.
Finding guidelines to tailor the rotation system and to organize the many variables is necessary for implementing an agronomically and economically sound crop rotation. The benefits of and barriers to adopting crop rotationsnare listed first. A specific crop rotation plan will not necessarily lend itself to every attribute, but farmers can try to get as many benefits as possible. The benefits usually associated with good crop rotations are:
• Maintains good soil physical condition and organic matter
• Improves distribution of plant nutrients in the soil by varying the feeding range of roots.
• Improves fertility with legume nitrogen and, when using green manure crops, makes other plant nutrients more available
• Fosters the most effective use of manure and fertilizer
• Helps control weeds, some plant diseases and insect pests
• Reduces need for purchased herbicides and fertilizer
• Can enhance soil moisture management
• Promotes income diversity and stability through increased marketing options
• Better allocates farmer’s labor and equipment usage through the year
• Improves crop quality and yields by 10 - 15%
• Provides low cost forages for livestock with return of manure on cropland
• Reduces the cost of conservation compliance
• Improves diversification and soil quality to reduce drought impact
• Reduces soil erosion. Increases flora, fauna and wildlife diversity and numbers
• Improves water quality through reduction in loss of agricultural chemical off-field"
I have watched the same crops grown on the same section of land over and over again, the only difference is the seasons. Harvest one day beginning of soil preparation the next.
"crop rotations was never widely practiced in American agriculture."
Meanwhile you can try to depict me as an enemy of farmers all you want. I am interested in eating and being clothed. I'm quite content to allow farmers to continue to grow food and fiber the way they did right up until the smelt stopped the pumps.
We don't have to worry about pine tree forests growing on the valley floor anyway ...no water.