“In the discovery of secret things and in the investigation of hidden causes, stronger reasons are obtained from sure experiments and demonstrated arguments than from probably conjectures and the opinions of philosophical speculators of the common sort.” – William Gilbert Articles EPA re BDCP: The short version Worrisome language in the Water Bond “At the table” about habitat Revisiting the Delta Plan’s House of Mirrors EPA re BDCP: The short version People who follow Delta issues know by now that the California Natural Resource Agency will be recirculating the BDCP Draft and environmental documents early next year. This may be largely in response to a letter they received from the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency giving a long list of problems [...]

We will now discuss in a little more detail the Struggle for Existence. – Charles Darwin, The Origin of Species Articles Hunger and thirst Speaking of BDCP …. 2014 State of Our Rivers Symposium Hunger and thirst By Jane Wagner-Tyack UOP economist Dr. Jeffrey Michael reports in an April 7 blog post that between 2007 and 2012, despite the drought in 2009, San Joaquin Valley agriculture made a clear shift toward permanent crops. Over that period, acreage of field crops (like cotton, hay, grain, and alfalfa) increased by 2 percent. Acreage of fruit and nut crops (like almonds, pistachios and grapes, crops that can’t be fallowed in a dry year) increased by 21 percent. Meanwhile, acreage of vegetable crops decreased [...]

“The struggle of man against power is the struggle of memory against forgetting.” – Milan Kundera Taking advantage of a crisis Most people except some overwrought San Joaquin Valley congressmen and the Speaker of the US House of Representatives realize by now that there’s no water for farming right now because THERE’S NO WATER. Even if we had twin tunnels today, there would be no water to put in them. Reservoirs serving agricultural users were in good shape earlier this year (and those serving Southern California urban users still are). But the Department of Water Resources and the Bureau of Reclamation pumped a lot of water out of reservoirs north of the Tehachapis this past summer, gambling that we would [...]

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE: Wednesday, January 22, 2014 Contact: Steve Hopcraft 916/457-5546; [email protected]; Twitter: @shopcraft; @MrSandHillCrane; Barbara Barrigan-Parrilla 209/479-2053 [email protected]; Twitter: @RestoretheDelta Tunnels critics blast Congressional move to suspend Endangered Species Act to favor Westlands, Kern mega-growers during drought The move to push forward legislation by Congressman Devin Nunes, Congressman Kevin McCarthy, and Congressman David Valadao, with the support of House Speaker John Boehner, to allow the Sacramento-San Joaquin Delta pumps to operate “as long as water is available” in a drought is nothing more than a blatant, short-sighted water grab, fueled by years of political contributions from huge growers in the Westlands Water District and the Kern County Water Agency to these Central Valley Congressional Representatives. Furthermore, we find it [...]