California farmers won't get federal water

[Redfairen]

Source: Associated Press

Federal officials announced Friday that without a lot more rain and snow many California farmers caught in the state's drought can expect to receive no irrigation water this year from a vast system of rivers, canals and reservoirs interlacing the state.

The U.S. Bureau of Reclamation released its first outlook of the year, saying that the agency will continue to monitor rain and snow fall, but the grim levels so far prove that the state is in the throes of one of its driest periods in recorded history.

Unless the year turns wet, many farmers can expect to receive no water from the federally run Central Valley Project. Central Valley farmers received only 20 percent of their normal water allotment last year and were expecting this year's bad news. Some communities and endangered wildlife that rely on the federal water source will also suffer deep cuts.

"We will monitor the hydrology as the water year progresses and continue to look for opportunities to exercise operational flexibility," Reclamation Commissioner Michael L. Connor said in a written statement, noting that the state's snowpack is at 29 percent of average for this time of year.



Read more: http://www.fresnobee.com/2014/02/21/3783038/california-farmers-brace-for-little.html

[hunter]

1. Won't hurt the farmers so much as the farmworkers.

[Berlum]

2. ...and the eaters

[Le Taz Hot]

20. Well, yes it will hurt the farmers.

If you have fields with any perennials, (grapes, stone fruit, citrus, etc.), what do you think happens to plants/trees that go without water for months at a time? They die and a farm without live plants/trees means the farmer has just lost his/her entire investment and livelihood. To replant could mean hundreds of thousands or millions of dollars and that will be out of reach for most small to mid-sized farmers.

[hunter]

23. Farmworkers live a lot closer to the edge.

And they are not the ones who gambled on water and lost.

People lose their jobs all of the time. It would be awesome if there was a safety net for everyone, but there's not, especially not for the undocumented workers.

The rotten thing all along has been the way small farms are consolidated into much larger farms, squeezing the smaller farmers out, and transferring their assets to the mega-corporate farmers.

Climate change may accelerate this process.

I've got ZERO sympathy for giant agricultural and banking corporations hiding behind smaller farmers.

In California's Central Valley some of the corporate giants, especially those on toxic land irrigated with subsidized water, simply ought to be shut down. Let the owners stand in line for food stamps with all their former workers.

Maybe things would change then and we'd get some kind of New Deal out of it.

But that's not what will happen. The big money players will simply move away to trash some other place, unharmed by the human and environmental catastrophes they created.

[Le Taz Hot]

25. In 2012, California brought in

$44.7 billion into the state. It's the #1 way the state earns money. To completely dismiss this type of loss as "people lose their jobs all of the time" is nothing short of mind-boggling. The losses aren't just confined to "those people" who you seem to determine are below contempt and, therefore, deserve what they get, the entire STATE loses. The NATION loses because those are numbers on the plus side of Trade.

The figure above represents California's 80,500 farms. There are still MANY small to medium-sized farms and many of them are family-owned. An integral part of farming has ALWAYS been "who gambled on water and lost." It's inherent in the occupation. You speak as if it's an indictment.

You spew the typical Bay Area bile about this area and it's practices that seems to be so common with people having absolutely NO knowledge of the subject except what you read in articles from publications 5,000 miles away.

These are losses that will be innumerable and the fact that you're dismissing all of it with some sort of elitist neo-liberal bullshit turns my stomach. And here I thought throw-the-baby-out-with-the-bathwater mentality was limited to the conservative agenda. I see I was in error.

[hunter]

32. Bay area bile?

I live in the middle of big ag, that's where the money and income in our household originates. There are roads around here with my family names on them.

And I say this in spite of the nose on my face.

The people who created this catastrophe will not suffer, they will fly away to greener pastures.

The ordinary middle class will suffer ordinary middle class fates, foreclosures and such.

The farm workers, especially undocumented farm workers, many who have been working here in California for many years, they are just out of luck.

It's a scary thing. We need to set up a system for recycling and relocating entire communities because things are only going to get worse, especially as the oceans rise.

How do we gracefully abandon what we've built in ways that are least harmful to those who have little or nothing, and least harmful to what remains of our natural environment?

Or is it just going to be disaster after disaster, over and over again, a wretched process of gentrification and the exile of people who have nothing left, ongoing until our society breaks down entirely?

There are places all over the world, and here in California, that will have to be abandoned.

The shit's getting real.

[Bennyboy]

29. The farmworkers are staying south....

They just won't be coming up here this year. And you can follow a steady decline in border crossing, both legal and illegal since this started.

[Loaded Liberal Dem]

3. Shut down Los Angeles, Las Vegas and Phoenix

Three cities who have no right being where they are.

[JDPriestly]

12. If we shut down places that have no right being where they are, we would have to shut down

much of Florida. They cleared swamps to build a lot of Florida, and the swamps and their water is just waiting to take back what Floridians stole from them.

On edit, Southern California where Los Angeles is located is pretty close to a desert. I changed my front yard to suit the realitylast Fall. It looks great in this dry weather. It's the farmers in the Central Valley north of us who are in really bad shape.

The unfortunate thing is that we don't put a moratorium on the building of new housing in the state until we find water.

[hedgehog]

26. "If we shut down places that have no right being where they are, we would have to shut down

much of Florida. "


You say that like that's a bad thing.........

[handmade34]

4. tough choices...

http://www.davidsuzuki.org/blogs/science-matters/2014/02/trading-water-for-fuel-is-fracking-crazy/


"It would be difficult to live without oil and gas. But it would be impossible to live without water. Yet, in our mad rush to extract and sell every drop of gas and oil as quickly as possible, we’re trading precious water for fossil fuels.

A recent report, “Hydraulic Fracturing and Water Stress”, shows the severity of the problem. Alberta and B.C. are among eight North American regions examined in the study by Ceres, a U.S.-based nonprofit advocating for sustainability leadership."

One of the most disturbing findings is that hydraulic fracturing, or fracking, is using enormous amounts of water in areas that can scarcely afford it. The report notes that close to half the oil and gas wells recently fracked in the U.S. “are in regions with high or extremely high water stress” and more than 55 percent are in areas experiencing drought. In Colorado and California, almost all wells—97 and 96 percent, respectively—are in regions with high or extremely high water stress, meaning more than 80 percent of available surface and groundwater has already been allocated for municipalities, industry and agriculture...

[theHandpuppet]

17. All fracking operations should be halted during the drought

Unfortunately, we all know that won't happen. Neither will there be a moratorium on diverting much of the region's water supply to the growing of thirsty crops like alfalfa, which are shipped directly to China.

[Bennyboy]

30. Lot of fracking wells in CA

already...

[MindMover]

5. Oil pipeline, how about a WATER PIPELINE .... ????

[Brother Buzz]

6. We've got tons of canals for moving water around California

If we bored a tunnel into the Sierra and tapped Lake Tahoe we'd be on Easy Street. Hell, we could even make a shitload of electricity in the process, too.

[CreekDog]

14. How much would you lower the lake level?

And how would you supply the truckee and carson rivers?

[Brother Buzz]

18. Let them Bore their own damn tunnel...

and let the race begin. Lake Tahoe holds over four time as much water as Lake Mead.

[CreekDog]

22. Youre asking the Pyramid Lake Tribe to bore a tunnel?

Pretty callous.

[Brother Buzz]

27. By default they can end up with the spoils of war and not do a thing...

All they have to do is sit back and watch the salinity of Pyramid Lake drop while powers-that-be race to drain Lake Tahoe.

It's a win-win for the wily Paiutes

[CreekDog]

35. You're admitting you pullled this idea out of you hind regions now

And the more you talk the more convinced you are that your ignorance offers a superiorsolution to tge drought than anyone working to protect cities, tribes, wildlife and ecology.

Not my brother.

[Brother Buzz]

39. The idea of boring through the solid granite Sierra should have been your first clue

I first heard this bombastic idea from a 'change jingler' back during the drought of 1976.

[Earth_First]

36. Don't plan on pumping out The Great Lakes. nt

[proverbialwisdom]

7. Read this today.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/magazine-26124989

18 February 2014 Last updated at 19:40 ET

California drought: Why farmers are 'exporting water' to China

By Alastair Leithead
BBC News, Los Angeles

[DeSwiss]

8. Always follow the $$$$

[jsr]

9. +1

[sendero]

16. Interesting....

.... I heard a radio segment a few days ago in which a farmer blamed some endangered smelt for his problems. "why do we reserve water for fish when people need it"? he asked.

"people" don't need it. who needs it are farmers who are trying to grow food in places that don't have natural water supplies. they are not doing it out of the goodness of their hearts they do it for profit. and they don't care to pay the actual cost for the water they use quite profligately.

everyone has known for decades that the way water is used for California farming is unsustainable. the point of no sustain has been reached. find another place to grow stuff.

[Le Taz Hot]

21. Tsk tsk.

Misleading. Here's the actual quote:

""A hundred billion gallons of water per year is being exported in the form of alfalfa from California," argues Professor Robert Glennon from Arizona College of Law.

We're exporting crops which we've done for decades. It's how California makes most of its money -- agricultural exports. Nothing new here.

[Redfairen]

33. What nonsense. The big coastal cities "export water" when they flush the toilet.

It goes out to sea. Bye-bye water, gone to another place in the world. You can make this sort of pointless argument about nearly any use of water. Heaven forbid, we ever try to manage it well in the first place. Oh no, no, no, that's politically impossible.

[proverbialwisdom]

34. FYI, I posted a link to an article written by a BBC News reporter, nothing else.

Last edited Sat Feb 22, 2014, 06:16 PM - Edit history (1)

I'm not informed on the subject personally and made no assertions whatsoever. Your post belongs as a comment at the BBC website, not as a response directed at me. Crowdsourcing and critiquing information can be accomplished without animosity.

[Redfairen]

37. My apologies. It was never intended as a shot against you.

I was commenting on the nonsense of the argument within the link. I could've said it better.

That said, I'm not going to go post on evey site that offers an argument deserving of a response, as you suggested. There are too many of them out there. It's entirely appropriate to respond here if it's linked here. Otherwise, why link it? Thank you for postin, all the same.

[proverbialwisdom]

38. No problem. Thank you for the thread. (nt)

[Garion_55]

10. I lived in Cali from 70-98 i remember a bad drought

we had maybe late 80s? and the big discussion was about desalination plants. dont think it ever went anywhere. too bad maybe if they had spent the last 20 years building them, drought wouldnt be an issue.

[CreekDog]

15. You buyin $12 tomatoes?

Nobody's gping to irrigate with mucho pricey reverse osmosis water.

[Tumbulu]

11. This is a worse drought than in '77 when the wells on my farm went dry.....

And so we are all wondering what to do. The groundwater table has been dropping, there is a 8 month wait list with the well drillers....I had a plan to put certain crops in this year, but now do not plan on planting anything just so that I will have water for my sheep to drink (but what will they eat?). All the other farmers are trying to figure out how to save permanent crops like trees and vines and perennials that took a lot of money to establish...and we are all hoping for just a few more big rainstorms. We are 1/3 of normal now, three weeks ago we were at less than 10% of normal after two really dry years.

All the grass fed ranchers are having to cull their herds by at least 50% because there is no grass for the animals to eat. Overstocking will ruin the soil. And with the water being cut there will be very little alfalfa or other feeds available for the animals even if we had the money to buy feed.

Those of us doing organic and sustainable do not just go and buy animals when things get better, we breed and select our animals for suitability to the soil and the lands our animals inhabit.

it is a scary time for us.

[CrawlingChaos]

13. But we won't be closing any golf courses, I take it? (nt)

[Bennyboy]

31. Article on NORCAL golf courses here:

http://www.sacbee.com/2014/02/18/6169698/making-the-rounds-drought-testing.html and there are a ton of them. a ton.

[Todays_Illusion]

19. But don't worry, California oil producers need that water more than those farmers and fish.

But there is another big water user in Kern County – the oil industry. In spite of the dwindling production from its aging oilfields, Kern County still accounts for 10 percent of U.S. domestic oil production. While occupying a far smaller land footprint than the county’s agricultural users, the Kern County oil industry consumes a staggering volume of water. According to the California Division of Oil, Gas and Geothermal Resources, Kern County oil companies injected 1.3 billion barrels of water and steam into the ground in order to produce 162 million barrels of oil a year.

http://www.circleofblue.org/waternews/2010/world/california-drought-is-no-problem-for-kern-county-oil-producers/

[proverbialwisdom]

24. More.

http://www.economist.com/news/united-states/21596955-drought-forcing-westerners-consider-wasting-less-water-drying-west

The drying of the West

Drought is forcing westerners to consider wasting less water
Feb 22nd 2014 | LAKE MEAD, NEVADA | From the print edition

http://www.sfgate.com/news/article/Drought-Feds-cut-water-to-Central-Valley-farmers-5256131.php

Drought: Feds cut water to Central Valley farmers to zero

Kurtis Alexander
Updated 6:39 am, Saturday, February 22, 2014

via http://www.environmentalhealthnews.org via Twitter.

[ghoti]

28. Back in the late 1950s

one of my college professors predicted that the next American civil war will be over water.