Drying up the delta: 19th century policies underlie today's crises (LAT)

[petronius]

HAMILTON CITY, Calif. — A shallow inland sea spreads across more than 160 square miles, speckled with egrets poking for crayfish among jewel-green rice shoots.

The flooded fields could be mistaken for the rice paddies of Vietnam or southern China, but this is Northern California at the onset of severe drought.

The scene is a testament to the inequities of California's system of water rights, a hierarchy of haves as old as the state.

Thanks to seniority, powerful Central Valley irrigation districts that most Californians have never heard of are at the head of the line for vast amounts of water, even at the expense of the environment and the rest of the state.

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http://www.latimes.com/science/la-me-delta-flows-20140323,0,4858708.story

A nice summary of CA water rights and recent debate...

[SunSeeker]

1. Great article.

2 things struck me. The wastefulness of growing water thirsty crops like rice in bone dry California, and the unfairness of water allocation to "senior" ("first in time&quot users who get water at a fraction of the cost that the rest of us pay, just because some distant relative posted a piece of paper on an oak tree somewhere over 100 years ago staking claim to a big chunk of what flows through the Sacramento River.

[Xithras]

3. I can't argue your second point, but as to the first.

The wastefulness of growing water thirsty crops like rice in bone dry California

Much of the Sacramento and San Joaquin Valley's were seasonal marshlands before the water diversions started. Many Californian's mistakenly believe that the Valleys were deserts (and some portions of it were) but the majority of the Valley floor was marshlands and damp meadows fed by Sierra runoff. Naturalist John Muir described the Valley many times as an unbroken meadow of flowers and marshes that changed color throughout the year, from green, to yellow and purple, to white and red, as the different flower species bloomed through the seasons. He was not describing a desert.

Irrigating this land simply provides it with a small percentage of the water that it once received naturally.

[SunSeeker]

4. But is rice the best use of this water now?

Much of the water that made these areas marsh has been diverted, as you note. Houses have been built on what were once marshes after the marshes dried out. There is nothing "natural" about the rice fields. Maybe they used to grow rice in marshes, but not now. Now, 95% of CA's rice is grown within 100 miles of the State Capital. This is an arid area. The fields would be bone dry without irrigation. Flooding them to grow sushi rice is a waste of water.

http://www.calrice.org/Industry+Info/About+California+Rice/California+Rice+Growing+Region.htm

[Xithras]

5. Sorry, that's just wrong.

95% of CA's rice is grown within 100 miles of the State Capital. This is an arid area.

The word "Arid" means a region with a severe lack of available water, and tending to lack vegetation. None of the region within 100 miles of Sacramento qualified for that description naturally. Sacramento was a swamp before it was leveed, bright green and full of wildlife. Those rice fields all sit on former marshlands that are only "dry" because they are drained and leveed as well. It's a naturally wet area that humans dry out for convenience.

Much of that region of the Central Valley is an environmental catastrophe, with many of the native forms of wildlife barely maintaining a toehold in an environment that has been utterly transformed (mostly for the worse) by mankind. Those flooded fields provide some of the last remaining seasonal habitat in the Valley for many of our native marsh birds and other remaining wildlife. They are also essential to simulating the natural flood events that once recharged the Valley's aquifers and in many areas are the only things keeping those aquifers from collapsing.

Don't get me wrong, I have no love for rice farmers. I'd personally like to see vast swathes of the Valley depopulated and given BACK to nature. Tear down the levees, open up the dams, let the rivers flood, and bring back the marshes that once existed.

You are arguing to complete the environmental destruction of these regions by removing the last relatively small amounts of water that we still allow to flow over them. Is this the best use of the water? Humans might have "better" uses for it, but those uses come at the expense of what little nature the Valley has left.

The Central Valley around Sacramento used to look a lot like this:

and this:


After a century of agricultural development, most of it now looks like this:


Strip the farms of that water for "better uses", and you'll just turn it into this:


The Valley does not receive enough direct rainfall to stay alive on its own. If we take away ALL of the water that once naturally flowed across it, it will simply turn into a full blown desert. Those rice fields may not be "natural", but they're actually the closest thing we have to the natural flood conditions that used to inundate the Valley annually. They provide one of the last remaining habitats for the Valley's flood adapted wildlife.

[SunSeeker]

6. Nothing I said is wrong. You admit this is arid land but for irrigation.

The flatlands where the rice is now around Sacramento were never the Eden of your cartoon. Justifying keeping Sacramento rice fields flooded "for the wildlife" is rice farmer propaganda, as that link I gave confirms. It is not the best use of our increasingly precious water, nor is it the best environment for wildlife. The nitrate and pesticide polluted water of the rice fields is not what we should be using to recharge our groundwater either.

A better use of the water would be to divert less from the rivers so more could reach the delta and recharge estuaries and groundwater. The area around Sacramento can be replanted with less water intensive crops, that can survive on that smaller water allotment, like olive trees. The habitat we need to be restoring are estuaries. Estuaries give us fish, are important for our ocean quality AND provide important bird habitat. Then those poor birds won't have to land in polluted rice fields.

But don't worry. Your rice fields are safe. The agribusiness that own them have senior rights to the rest of us, as the article notes.

[XemaSab]

7. You ever bird Glenn and Colusa?

The small refuges down there provide some habitat, but ducks and shorebirds and egrets treat the rice fields like a buffet.

[SunSeeker]

8. A very expensive, polluted and wasteful buffet.

It does not justify the rice fields and their waste of such a huge diversion of the Sacramento River. There are better ways to feed the birds.

[XemaSab]

9. What's a better way to feed the birds?

This should be good.

[SunSeeker]

10. Read what I said above.

We should be restoring estuaries and the delta, not wasting huge amounts of precious water growing sushi rice in an arid climate.

But since you disagree, then I, the NDRC and every professor cited in that article must all be wrong.

[pinto]

2. Good read.

Thanks for the post.