California Drought
 

After the 25% urban water usage reduction order this week, what are your plans to deal with what looks like an ever increasing drought in California?

geo

I don't live in a drought area. Since California grows a good portion of our fruit & vegetables the prices will get so inflated or worse may not be available at all in the near future..

SO my plan is plant more fruit and veggies that I can eat fresh AND preserve myself until the next growing season-of coarse I can't grow everything in NYS so I will just grow what I can and have to go without what I can't grow.

My stepson lives in San Jose. He was saying they have a year worth of water left. We visited him a couple weeks ago and it looked like the city people and farmers are really going at it.

Not to worry. Governor Brown's drought bill also had over 600 million dollars in it for flood control. Go figure. Apparently he knows something we don't.

Seems pretty easy to understand that an area with occasional intense Pacific storms has its normally dry washes overflow despite their being mostly bone dry. Not maintaining dikes and subimpoundments makes losing roads, bridges, and homes much more likely. "Flood control" could include replanting desert slopes that have been burnt over by wildfires, too. Anyone who lives out west can tell you about flash floods and landslides wiping out areas when one of those big storms sweeps through a burnt-over area that can't hold moisture without vegetation. All it takes to comprehend such general programs, imo, is some common sense and lack of an agenda to get snarky about one politician or another.

I'm far from California.

I've lived and farmed through some drought, and more flooding on my farm.

We have to work with man nature, and realize we live in cycles of weather. Some periods are too dry, others are too wet, and we are humans, we adapt and we get by.

Its tough and serious and devastating when it happens to you, but the cycle will change and we will learn to conserve if it lasts longer and we will learn to install pumps if it cycles the other way.

And we will go on.

It will be fine.

Most here tent to be a tad self sifficent and so likely don't have to do much of anything special?

Paul

Popcorn.

I don't live in California, so if they're just having an urban water reduction it doesn't effect me. I think it's high time they should be conserving and reducing their urban water use and that they should have started doing it many, many decades ago.

However, if and when it becomes a reduction in water required for California's agricultural purposes then that's a different story because they won't be growing all the same produce they presently do. I expect I'll have to resort to closer local resources for some of the fruits and veggies I presently get as imports from California.

Hey there, i'm from California....55 years here. 80% 0f all the water used here is for agricultural purposes, 20% is residential and commercial, so the biggest savings come from fallowing fields. Most folks have pretty much done all they can do reasonably, so not much to gain from homeowners.

One needs to remember that over a decade ago, water was cut off due to the Delta Smelt, so the farms in the central valley which produce the majority of produce here, were fallowed. Hundreds of thousands of acres of no production. Now we have "the drought", but still building new homes at an astonishing rate. A new football stadium is in the works. The DWP wastes millions of gallons of water daily due to the lack of infrastructure improvements despite the fact that $265 million dollars was transferred to the city of Los Angeles general fund last year. (the dwp also blew several hundred million dollars on defective software and wants the rate payers to fund the fix). Hundreds of billions of gallons of fresh water could be saved by exporting illegal aliens back to their home countries, but instead, we no longer export food, but import it in greater quantities than ever, some is tainted.(think strawberries that killed kids)

And the "scientist" from JPL has been admonished for stating we have only water for a year. That's complete nonsense. We used to have many reservoirs, but the unbalanced environmentalists sued to have them removed, and our courts here have never seen an environmental law they didn't like, sided with them, so many were torn down. Now were paying for their arrogance.

By the way, our governor is a complete duffus, think high speed rail and billions of dollars wasted! Moonbeam it really is!!!

California doesn't have a water shortage they have a storage problem. all the water that fall in California runs to the Pacific Ocean .no dams because they want to provide for the fish that is not native to the area.

http://www.times-standard.com/genera...ater-reservoir

For a handy dandy look at how water politics works, this link gives a story on the State mandated water cuts to our area, , which contrary to the map, is doing pretty average for water.
The State will not give a waiver for these cuts despite the reservoir serving all the local cities being full. There is no way to reserve water not used, the pot growers will still suck the creeks dry during the dry season, the local tribes will fight any increase in water diversion downsouth or east as, despite much noise about useless fish being saved, the diversion cause massive salmon die off due to the lack of flows during spawning. And salmon are not useless.
California is not just LA and SF, though they make the loudest noise. It's a State that is astoundingly variable.

And instead of building a huge desalination plant CA is building some high speed rail. Makes no sense. Spend money on something that REALLY matters like getting Water to those that need it.

That is a defect of the ballot proposal system. The voters approved transportation money, so that is where it must be spent. Any water bond money will be spent on that only (sort of because all recent proposals have irritating loose language.) If you ask the voters about approving a proposal, they do it based on the silly title and lobby groups ads. The actual proposals are way beyond complex and often not only do not do what they say but sometimes do the opposite.
Frankly, when a year of rain returns, the the State will have acres of slides as that is the effect. No rains, no slides. Then a good rain allows all that unstable land to go at one time instead of gradually.
Beside a desalination plant is not worth the cost if the rains return. So the tendency will be to hold off to see if they do.
Mother Nature has the final say here- usually very directly.

The mega central valley farmers get no sympathy from me until they join the rest of the human race and start learning how to save water. There is nothing more annoying than driving down I-5 on a hundred degree afternoon and seeing overhead sprinklers spewing water that mostly evaporates before it hits the ground. They are addicted to cheap water and squeal like a stuck pig if anybody dares to threaten their hold on it.

I like salmon. I like having salmon in healthy rivers. I don't like greedy corporations pretending to be family farms avoiding any of the responsibility the rest of us are required to have. I know it's fun to blame the mean ol' gubbymint for everything, but occasionally you have to take responsibility for your actions, and the central valley is way overdue.

I don't mind exporting our water to those that need it to the south, it's what a decent society does, what I do mind is having that water wasted by those that feel their desire to make an extra buck by doing nothing is an entitlement.

Like Twain said, whiskey is for drinking, water is for fighting... :)

I hear ya...

Farmers are still pulling out grazing land and planting acres and acres of wine grapes around here. Nice...another crop to export that relies on consistent water and cannot go without.

Now, if they pulled out grazing land to plant hops...I might be swayed. :)

After reading the comments so far, I would have to conclude that the subject of water in California is highly politicised. If I were thinking af starting a homestead in California, I would consider moving to a different state, just because of the uncertainty of getting enough water for my use in growing my own crops and animals. Too many laws, too many people, too many conflicting interests. In summary: the water over my head, the water flowing by me, the water underneath me is not really mine--or could be taken from me or shut off at any time....

geo

It seems like everything is a political mud fest now.

I think the same thing about Colorado and it's water uncertainty. Water conservation only goes so far and when the supply isn't enough it isn't enough.

Much of what allows water regulation- the Federal Clean Water Act- applies to you too. It defines water systems, regulates quality at various levels, etc same as here.

That is true in all states in America. It's true in pretty much all countries in the world.

Does CA allow rainwater harvesting by individuals? If so, I would think folks would go that route.
I'm in an area of Texas that has been hit hard by drought the past 5 years, and we are pretty dry even in good times. For the past 25+ years I've had rainwater catchment systems. The last place I lived that was the only water I had. Where I now live, I supplement city water by the rain tanks. I can store 2600 gallons, which isn't a lot, but certainly helps water the garden in mid-summer.

I have never heard of any restriction on catchment. I know there are peopke in my area that do it. Even fog harvesting.

The farmers are ONLY getting 20% of the water they have asked for.
400,000 farming acres have been taken out of production with the lost of 20,000 Jobs last year.
I think that some should feel bad for them at least. And when people go to the store and prices have sky rocketed You can Thank the Farmer for cutting back on water.

http://www.msn.com/en-us/news/us/as-...ife/ar-AAarkQM

http://www.weatherwest.com/wp-conten...omimage-12.gif

Interesting wesrern states by county drought map. Much better than the ones I've seen in the press.

http://www.weatherwest.com/wp-conten...omimage-12.gif

Interesting wesrern states by county drought map. Much better than the ones I've seen in the press.
I wonder if the fact that the drought seems to be worse in the most populated areas of the coast from San Francisco south has an influence on reporting

I feel sorry for the farmers...but...farming in a desert? Seriously, what did they think was going to happen? If they were farming cactus that would be different.

If the state would put in as many check dams as possible it would really help. Check this out... http://www.geofflawton.com/fe/78636-desert-check-dams

Or this... http://www.geofflawton.com/fe/73485-...merican-desert

Or this... http://www.geofflawton.com/fe/62176-desert-oasis

Give me some desert and in ten years it will be green.

The Central Valley is not really a desert at least the upper half. But California has a serious rainy season, where it rains a lot and a serious dry season, where it hardly ever rains. So if you want to have the year round growing that the temperatures allow, you have to irrigate during the dry season. And they have quite an elaborate infrastructure in place to do that.
But that just moves the water from the mountain snow and reservoirs where farming is not possible to the growing area down below. If there is no snow pack nothing really builds up the water to have to distribute later in the year.

I don't see anything except a way to register.

Here's an interesting article on collecting water for year round use.
http://ag.arizona.edu/oals/ALN/aln46/lancaster.html

I've also seen articles that show how to make contour ditches to collect the water and put it underground.

Those are pretty much what was linked to, videos on swales, gabions, check dams, etc. Trees take up the water that gets put underground and grow quickly. Leaf litter then mulches the ground, preventing much evaporation. Extra plant growth then starts, and you've got greenery. Make those edible plants and understory trees, and you've got a good forest going in a formerly inhospitable place.

Never heard of fog harvesting before. Fascinating stuff. Sounds like a much easier process than making a dew pond!

One of the questions I would have about swales and some of the other things is in places of seasonal heavy rain as opposed to continuously low level rain. I could see swales being subject to serious erosion by heavy run off during the rainy season.
Half my life is spent digging ditches to keep water moving on followed by heavy mulching to keep some moisture at the end of the rainy season. That is why my favorite mulch is shredded redwood bark- it does not wash away like other mulches such as leaves or compost. Soon I will be going down hill to retrieve some of the build up in the low areas that came from uphill.

Swales are then usually seeded with ground covers and if large enough, trees, to prevent erosion from occurring on the mound. It really shouldn't be much of a problem if you have quickly draining soil though. Water doesn't stay in swales that long since it isn't sealed like a pond would be.

Really, mulch will work anytime anywhere, both for keeping moisture and letting it flow off. Check out Back to Eden gardening. For places which are too steep and get eroded anyway, using berms and terraces would be a good option to look into.

Well, one itty bitty corner of California is out of drought according to the maps. May it spread south.........

They just want your email address to send you notices when a new video comes out. You can send any emails to the junk folder if you don't want them.
He has tons of good videos.

So...if they empty the reservoirs on purpose why is anyone surprised that they are empty? Is it true that they are just running it out to sea? That's a problem people in government created if so.

Dam releases are just a recognition that the water supplies other demands than people's direct uses. Lack of flows can kill fish, birds, plants, etc even in good rain years if all the water is held back. Just as the farmer depends on held back water, the fisherman, tribes, tourist industry, hunters, etc depend on flows.
It is not a simple balance.

I don't live in California anymore, but I have been checking out the drought and the ramifications of the mismanagement at the state and federal levels. I certainly don't understand all of the political nuances of the water management efforts in California.

That said, I want to share an 8 minute video produced by a California State Assemblywoman who serves in Kern County, a county affected by the drought and an area which appears to be losing their fight to maintain farming and agricultural water at an alarming rate.

This video explains how the Federal Endangered Species Act has contributed to the current drought in California.

There are lots of interesting statistics cited here. At the 4 minute mark I've watched it over and over wondering how the state water board could allow this to happen. The Federal Endangered Species Act should be modified to accommodate the change in water reserves that are being depleted and redirected from our food production farmers.

There are no easy answers here, but there are steps that should be taken immediately to ensure that the recovery time from this drought isn't extended by previously uncontrolled arbitrary federal legislation.


I've also included a link to a current Wall Street Journal article about this problem.

http://www.wsj.com/articles/californ...ght-1428271308

We depend on the environment for our life just as other species depend on it. It's not possible to keep making the bad decisions we are making and expect this planet to remain livable for us.

Here's an interesting article on how California exports water to China. http://www.bbc.com/news/magazine-26124989

I wonder if it will ever got to the point where there are water pipelines across North America in addition to all the oil pipelines.

Is there not the capacity to grow crops in other places where water is not an issue? I suppose California has the advantage of year round growing weather in much of the state.

Capitalism has serious flaws when it comes to allocating natural resources.