The Other Snowstorm in California Right Now, and a Water Problem of a Different Kind

The Sierra Nevada and Cascades are buried under record amounts of snow right now, but that's not the only "snow" falling in the state just now. More than a million acres of the state are covered in a blizzard of flower petals from blooming almond trees. The vast blanket of snow is a measure of the health of the water supply in California, but in a way, so is the blizzard of almond blossoms.

Almonds have become one of the leading cash crops in the state of California, which produces around 80% of the world supply. When world prices for almonds jumped a few years ago, agribusiness responded by putting in hundreds of thousands of acres of almond orchards, sometimes replacing other kinds of crops, and sometimes breaking new ground in less productive soils around the margins of the Great Valley. 25 years ago 400,000 acres were planted in almonds. Today it's 1.3 million acres, about 2,000 square miles. The problem is that almonds require a lot of water, around three to four feet per year. The new orchards in my county, several tens of thousands of acres, are getting their water from underground aquifers. The water they are tapping into will not be easy to replace.

I'm not sure we've adequately considered the conflicts of water use and almond expansion. People were paying a lot of attention during California's crippling drought of a few years ago, but those voices have quieted after a few wet years. The thing is, the trees in an orchard must have a fixed amount of water. One can't let a field lie fallow if water is in short supply like one can do with annual crops. The vast increase in almond orchards is adding to the "structural drought" in California, a situation in which even years of "normal" precipitation don't provide enough water to meet the minimum needs. Increasing temperatures related to global climate change will exacerbate the problem as we roll into the future. But as always, money talks.

Unfortunately, I don't see a good end to the haphazard and poorly planned expansion of almond orchards into the prairies of the Sierra Nevada foothills. The blooming trees that look so beautiful today may be abandoned snags before too long. The water is an intractable problem that will not be solved by the building of new dams. There aren't many good places left to put them, and there has to be enough precipitation to fill the dams and that's not assured in our changing climate.

But those trees are really beautiful right now!

POSTSCRIPT: I went up into the foothills today to do some birding and got some pictures of the almond groves covering many hillsides. It's shocking to me that the trees are planted in straight rows that have furrows leading downslope. It's an open invitation for very serious soil erosion, a lesson I thought we learned in the Dustbowl years.

Damn Fool California Farmers Bringing on a New Dust Bowl

The video is very short, but in eight seconds it shows the stupidity of bad agricultural practices in Central California, practices that have led to disaster in the past, and maybe into our immediate future as well.

Muddy runoff from an almond orchard east of Modesto. That's soil going away, never to return

I want to make it clear that I'm not condemning all farmers. The traditional small farmers were known for caring for the lands. In flat lands where winds can carry away topsoil, these people planted trees to serve as windbreaks, trees that wouldn't be mature until long after they had passed on. They were careful to prevent soil erosion by plowing with the topography, to prevent destructive runoff. They let fields lie fallow in some years to let soil recover. They were looking out for their descendants, but it was also an act of self-preservation. If they lost the land, they could literally starve.

Unfortunately, it's been a long time since "small" farmers provided the economic backbone of our country. Most farming today is performed by giant agribusinesses that are more concerned with the bottom line and short-term profits. There isn't much in the way of forward thinking in a corporate boardroom.

So why is it that I'm ranting on this subject today? We had a freak storm roll through the area this afternoon. In about twenty minutes we accumulated 0.5 inches of rain, and the sky was alive with thunder and lightning. We even had a funnel cloud over our village east of Modesto (video here). The skies cleared and the storm drifted east. I decided to make a slight detour on my way to work, so I headed east on Lake Road towards Turlock Reservoir and came across a shocking scene (for our region anyway): a hail-covered landscape.

A few moments later I encountered an even bigger problem, a flooded roadway. The water was very muddy, and I could immediately see the reason. The soil was washing off the adjacent slopes. It shouldn't be happening this way. The natural landscape in this area should be a short-grass prairie, and the water should have been absorbed into the soil, and the grassroots should have been holding the soil in place. Of course a heavy rain can flood a road, but it shouldn't be bury the road in sediment.

The problem is the high commodity prices for almonds due to intense demand for nuts in Asia. California produces most of the world's almonds, and for the last few years, tens of thousands of acres of grasslands have been ripped up and replaced by tree saplings. The orchards are already controversial because the trees require vast amounts of water, and there is no irrigation infrastructure to provide it in sufficient amounts. The orchards are being watered by newly drilled wells, and the water they are using is largely irreplaceable, as the water use far exceeds natural recharge. The wells are tapping into aquifers that provide water for Modesto and other cities in the Great Valley.

But another serious problem caught my attention this afternoon. The grass is gone, and herbicides are clearly being used to keep the soil barren in the rows between the trees. And the trees are in perfectly straight rows, no matter the shape of the topography.

In other words, these "farmers" (really investment groups) are breaking one of the most important lessons of the Dust Bowl era. To farm in a sustainable manner, one needs to work with the land, not against it. One of the main causes of soil loss in the Dust Bowl days was erosion of furrows that sloped towards the gullies and valleys because of an insistence on plowing in perfectly symmetrical rows no matter the underlying topography.

The soils of the eastern Great Valley and in the Sierra Foothills are much older and less fertile than those on the floor of the valley. They've not been replenished by river floods since the end of the last ice age some 13,000 years ago. As a result, there are fewer nutrients, and thick accumulations of clay prevent groundwater infiltration unless grass or other vegetation slows the water down. So today, with the grass cover stripped away, we are seeing increased soil erosion that seems to intensify with every storm.

The problem was made most clear as I was driving south on Hawkins Road (below). On the right side of the road, you can see the recently planted orchard, and the muddy water that is washing off the slope. In the foreground, the water on the road is clear. That's because the slope to my right was covered with prairie grass, not orchard.

This is what we get when farming gets taken over by corporate interests. One would think that in this modern era we would take steps to prevent soil loss. Soil is life itself, and is irreplaceable in human lifetimes. But...money talks. It yells. It shouts. And the land therefore suffers.

Oh, Nuts. What a Great Reason to Destroy the Remaining 5% of the Original California Prairie

Vernal swales on the summit area of Table Mountain. These have some similarity to vernal pools on the valley floor but are also different in some important respects. Click on this post for more info.

Word comes today in the Modesto Bee that a local "farmer" has been fined $160,000 and ordered to purchase conservation easements worth $1,000,000 after he oversaw the destruction of 33 acres of prime vernal pool habitat. He was in the process of converting 850 acres of leased grazing acreage to an almond orchard when his tractors "deep-ripped" 380 acres, including the vernal pools. He had been warned to get a ground-working permit from the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, but he didn't do so. He was confronted by officials on September 12 who stopped the tractors, but the damage had been done. The investor responsible said only that "I want to farm. That's all I want to do". No, he wanted to cash in, pure and simple. He knew he was flouting the law, and the penalty is appropriate.

Vernal swale on Table Mountain above Jamestown in the Sierra Nevada foothills

Vernal pools are one of the most unique aspects of the California prairie of the Great Valley and lower foothills of the Sierra Nevada. Many endemic species thrive in the pools, and they provide an incredible show of wildflowers in the spring (See this post for an example of the richness of the environment). They are a precious resource that deserve protection, and indeed many of the remaining pools are being preserved, at least on paper. They are defenseless against lawless land-developers, apparently.

There is very little of the original California prairie left, no more than five or ten percent. A lot of what is left has already been altered by grazing, but such lands are not getting particularly worse under that form of land use. It seems we hear that this new development or that one will only take only a few more acres, and a few more. Repeat over and over, and the last of the pools will be gone, especially if the politicians go through with their plans to restrict the power of the Environment Protection Agency and other government organizations to do their jobs and enforce the law.

Vernal pool east of Modesto

As the Bee article points out, People can comment on the proposed penalty by Dec. 18 by emailing r9hearingclerk@epa.gov or sending mail to Steven Armsey, U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, Region IX, 75 Hawthorne St., San Francisco, CA 94105. I hope you will consider writing and supporting the penalty. The water pirates are trying to cash in on the almond craze, and this landscape can ill-afford to be abused in this way. The water isn't there for the long term, and the orchards will die. But not before they've pulled every little bit of short-term profit they can.

Read more here: http://www.modbee.com/news/local/oakdale/article4005292.html#storylink=cpy

So many trees, so little water to keep them alive. But profit is profit.

It's a crime that the last vernal pools are being destroyed this way, and it is ultimately for a money-making scheme that is futile anyway. I talked about the groundwater issue a few months ago, and I am cutting and pasting the information below. Water is the ultimate controlling factor that will leave this as a wasted, barren landscape.

From March 14, 2014: The Water Pirates: A Can a Day is All We Ask (plus 107 million gallons)

New orchard on the California prairie

It's a sad and familiar story for California: there is a valuable resource in the ground, free for the taking. There are those who come to exploit the resource, tearing up the land and leaving behind a wake of destruction. There are no laws to control the behavior of the miners, except for a few arcane rules from a previous century. In the end the resource is gone, and so is the chance for any sustainable use of the land for future generations. In the end, it was all about money, which landed in the hands of a few powerful people. It certainly didn't benefit the ones who did all the physical work.

This could describe the effects of the California Gold Rush of the 1850s, but unfortunately it is not. It is a story that is happening right now in my neck of the woods (prairie?), and the worst of the destruction still lies ahead. And right now, there isn't a whole lot anyone can do to stop it. It's not gold, it's water. And despite the fact that gold is worth somewhere around $1,000 an ounce, the water is far more valuable.

Our local paper, the Modesto Bee, has been running a series of reports recently including this one by reporter J.N. Sbranti that should receive much wider exposure. Almonds have become a valuable and profitable commodity these days, and there is a wild rush on to plant as many acres of almonds as possible. In many cases farmers are simply switching from corn or other yearly crops and putting in orchards. The most destructive aspect, however is the planting of some 30,000 acres of almonds and other nut trees on the former prairie and grazing lands east of Modesto adjacent to the foothills of the Sierra Nevada.

The problem with the trees on the valley floor is that one can't let the fields lie fallow in the driest of years like the one we are now suffering through. The trees must be watered or they die, and they require 4 acre-feet of water per acre each year. If the water gets prohibitively expensive, so what? They'll have to pay the price.

California's version of "snow". The almonds are beautiful when they are blooming.

What's worse are those almond orchards in the foothills. They can't be irrigated by normal means, as there is no infrastructure to deliver water there from the local irrigation district. The only source of water is from the ground, and there are few if any rules regarding the use of the groundwater. The large agribusinesses simply buy up the cheap grazing lands, put in the trees, and start pumping vast amounts of groundwater to water them. According to the Sbranti report in the Bee, the 30,000 acres of new orchards are consuming 39 billion gallons of groundwater each year, which is more than is currently pumped for domestic use across the entire county. The groundwater resource is limited, and will likely be depleted in the service of these orchards. When the water runs out, the orchards will die, but the owners will have gotten their cash. All legally of course, and damn the consequences.

It's all well and good to complain about government regulations, but theoretically government exists to watch over the well-being of the citizens. When there is no governance, the pirates take over, and we all lose. There oughta be a law, but I don't hear about anyone working on it. Much too arcane a political issue. At least until the wells run dry...

The Water Pirates: A Can a Day is All We Ask (plus 107 million gallons)

New orchard on the California prairie

It's a sad and familiar story for California: there is a valuable resource in the ground, free for the taking. There are those who come to exploit the resource, tearing up the land and leaving behind a wake of destruction. There are no laws to control the behavior of the miners, except for a few arcane rules from a previous century. In the end the resource is gone, and so is the chance for any sustainable use of the land for future generations. In the end, it was all about money, which landed in the hands of a few powerful people. It certainly didn't benefit the ones who did all the physical work.

This could describe the effects of the California Gold Rush of the 1850s, but unfortunately it is not. It is a story that is happening right now in my neck of the woods (prairie?), and the worst of the destruction still lies ahead. And right now, there isn't a whole lot anyone can do to stop it. It's not gold, it's water. And despite the fact that gold is worth somewhere around $1,000 an ounce, the water is far more valuable.

Our local paper, the Modesto Bee, has been running a series of reports recently including this one by reporter J.N. Sbranti that should receive much wider exposure. Almonds have become a valuable and profitable commodity these days, and there is a wild rush on to plant as many acres of almonds as possible. In many cases farmers are simply switching from corn or other yearly crops and putting in orchards. The most destructive aspect, however is the planting of some 30,000 acres of almonds and other nut trees on the former prairie and grazing lands east of Modesto adjacent to the foothills of the Sierra Nevada.

The problem with the trees on the valley floor is that one can't let the fields lie fallow in the driest of years like the one we are now suffering through. The trees must be watered or they die, and they require 4 acre-feet of water per acre each year. If the water gets prohibitively expensive, so what? They'll have to pay the price.

California's version of "snow". The almonds are beautiful when they are blooming.

What's worse are those almond orchards in the foothills. They can't be irrigated by normal means, as there is no infrastructure to deliver water there from the local irrigation district. The only source of water is from the ground, and there are few if any rules regarding the use of the groundwater. The large agribusinesses simply buy up the cheap grazing lands, put in the trees, and start pumping vast amounts of groundwater to water them. According to the Sbranti report in the Bee, the 30,000 acres of new orchards are consuming 39 billion gallons of groundwater each year, which is more than is currently pumped for domestic use across the entire county. The groundwater resource is limited, and will likely be depleted in the service of these orchards. When the water runs out, the orchards will die, but the owners will have gotten their cash. All legally of course, and damn the consequences.

It's all well and good to complain about government regulations, but theoretically government exists to watch over the well-being of the citizens. When there is no governance, the pirates take over, and we all lose. There oughta be a law, but I don't hear about anyone working on it. Much too arcane a political issue. At least until the wells run dry...