The Widely Used quote, “Whiskey is for drinking; water is for fighting over,” often attributed to Mark Twain, has been used by politicians from Arnold Schwarzenegger to Dianne Feinstein to describe California’s battles over water rights. The quote itself may in fact bebogus, but it does illustrate why water rights are a difficult, but critical, topic in California.
Whether growing along the rim of the Grand Canyon or living in the mist with California’s coastal redwoods, Douglas fir trees are consistently sensitive to drought conditions that occur throughout the species’ range in the United States, according to a study led by a researcher at UC Davis. The study, published Monday in the journal Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, provides direct evidence of the negative impact of water stress on forest ecosystems. It also pinpointed which conditions are causing low growth among Douglas fir trees.
The first fin whale appeared in Marmot Bay, where the sea curls a crooked finger around Alaska’s Kodiak Island. A biologist spied the calf drifting on its side, as if at play. Seawater flushed in and out of its open jaws. Spray washed over its slack pink tongue. Death, even the gruesome kind, is usually too familiar to spark alarm in the wild north. But late the next morning, the start of Memorial Day weekend, passengers aboard the ferry Kennicott spotted another whale bobbing nearby. Her blubber was thick. She looked healthy. But she was dead too.
A wildfire burning out of control in mountains and foothills east of Los Angeles mushroomed more than 50 percent overnight, forcing authorities to order three school districts to cancel classes due to heavy smoke and dangerous conditions. More than 900 firefighters were battling the so-called Pilot Fire, which has charred some 7,500 acres of bone-dry tinder and brush in the San Bernardino Mountains since it broke out around noon on Sunday.
Millions of Americans may be drinking water with unsafe levels of industrial chemicals, according to a study published Tuesday in the journal Environmental Science & Technology Letters. These chemicals, known as polyfluoroalkyl and perfluoroalkyl substances or PFASs, have been linked to high cholesterol, obesity, hormone suppression — and even cancer. Introduced more than 60 years ago, PFASs are a category of man-made chemicals that degrade very slowly, if at all, in the environment.
Fresno County’s overall crop value fell to $6.61 billion last year from a high of $7 billion in 2014 as the region battled drought, lower commodity prices and production issues.
The drop was a disappointment, but not a surprise, as the 2015 Fresno County Crop Report was presented to the Board of Supervisors on Tuesday. “Still, with all of that, Fresno County farmers and ranchers come together to do something magical,” said Ryan Jacobsen, chief executive officer of the Fresno County Farm Bureau.
With the dual goals of cutting carbon emissions and reducing operational costs, the Metropolitan Water District of Southern California unveiled its latest investment in solar power today. Metropolitan board Chairman Randy Record joined General Manager Jeffrey Kightlinger to flip a ceremonial switch signifying the activation of two separate solar fields with 10,780 large, sun-tracking panels at the district’s F.E. Weymouth Water Treatment Plant in La Verne. The 3-megawatt solar installation covering 15.5 acres will generate about 6.5 million kilowatt-hours (kWh) of clean, renewable energy a year, offsetting nearly half of the plant’s energy demands.
As every Californian knows by now, our state is in the fifth year of a drought, and this persistent imbalance of supply and demand in our water supply is likely the new norm. The good news is that many of our state leaders have woken up to this fact, and in recent years have been clearing some of the logjams around smart water management. The state adopted a historic groundwater bill in 2014 to help ensure our reserves don’t run dry, and the legislature and voters passed a $7.5 billion water bond to help fund the infrastructure to make our state more resilient.
Looking north from Blue Canyon near Shaver Lake, copper-colored forests blanket mountain slopes that stretch ridge after ridge to the horizon. The patches of fading green that dappled these hillsides last fall have merged into an unbroken cover of rust-needled pines. At dusk, when the winds die down, an eerie stillness gives way to the muffled sound of munching as beetles chomp through one tree after another, thousands after thousands. This is the look — and the sound — of drought. Four consecutive winters with little to no snowpack, followed by four dry summers, have devastated California’s southern Sierra Nevada.
Californians are known to take pride in the state’s many exceptional characteristics. But in at least one important area, we’d be wise to learn a thing or two from our neighbors. Not only are the Golden State’s water management challenges shared by other western states, but many of these places use more advanced practices to understand how much water is available, who has claims to it, and how much is being used.
