California WaterBlog

by Francisco Bellido Leiva, Robert Lusardi and Jay Lund  We may be entering a time when more mechanistic understanding can be used to estimate effects of habitats and flows on fish populations and health, and help design ecosystem restoration efforts. An integrated portfolio approach to protecting and restoring winter-run salmon would begin with a model…

by Jay Lund California’s Governor Newsom recently declared a drought emergency throughout much of California and announced over $5 billion in new water program investments.  These twin emergency and funding announcements are a classic “bad-news creates good news story” (and potentially vice versa) for California’s water problems. They are opportunities for innovation and making long-term…

We asked some colleagues for lessons that might be useful in managing the California’s new drought. Here is a first sampling of thoughts. 1: Market-based approaches to water management will lessen the costs of drought. Katrina Jessoe. Agricultural and Resource Economics, UC Davis Climate models indicate that California’s droughts will become more frequent and severe.…

curated by Abbey Hill Much of water management draws on patterns involving randomness. This is typically done in building models based on organizing equations, but has some relevance to art. The following is a collection of art that relates randomness and patterns with reflections on  water management.  Helter Skelter I – by Mark Bradford (2007) …

curated by Abbey Hill Much of water management draws on patterns involving randomness. This is typically done in building models based on organizing equations, but has some relevance to art. The following is a collection of art that relates randomness and patterns with reflections on  water management.  Helter Skelter I – by Mark Bradford (2007) …

by Jay Lund California is in the second year of a drought. Governor Newsom this week made his first drought declaration.   Just how dry is this drought, so far?  What are some likely implications?  And what might State and local governments do about it? How dry is it?  California Data Exchange Center has some…

by Teejay O’Rear, John Durand, Peter Moyle Suisun Marsh is central to the health of the San Francisco Estuary. Not only is it a huge (470 km2) tidal marsh in the center the northern estuary (Figure 1), but it is an extremely important nursery area for species such as splittail, striped bass, longfin smelt, and, formerly,…

by Yiqing “Gracie” Yao and Jay Lund Salinity has often become a major limit for irrigated agriculture in semi-arid regions, from ancient Mesopotamia to parts of California today. A previous blog post showed that conjunctive use with more saline groundwater can differ fundamentally from freshwater aquifers. Higher salinity limits groundwater use for irrigation during dry…

Help restore one of California’s most endangered species while supporting California’s water supplies in a time of drought. The Federal government is beginning a program for the unemployed to retrain as much-needed Delta Smelt.  Following a two-day course, candidates will learn to: Seek out turbid waters Spawn in sand at secret locations Surf the tides…

by Andrew L. Rypel As if 2020, wasn’t completely strange enough, it wound up also being a time when Warren Buffett was plunged headlong into California water. Buffett of course is an American business tycoon – primarily an investor, and currently the 4th richest person on the planet. Although 90 years old, Buffett continues as…

By Jay Lund, Andrew L. Rypel, and Josue Medellin-Azuara As March begins to drag on with little precipitation in the forecast and few weeks left in California’s traditional wet season, we are in another dry year. This is California’s second dry year in a row since the 2012-2016 drought.  Statistically, California has the most drought…

by Yiqing “Gracie” Yao and Jay Lund Salinity is an eventual threat to agriculture and groundwater sustainability in parts of California, and other irrigated parts of the world. Irrigation, lower groundwater levels, and natural conditions have dramatically increased groundwater salinity in parts of California over the last 150 years (Hansen et al. 2018). Nearly two…

By Rich Pauloo and Graham Fogg Lower groundwater levels can prevent drainage of water and salts from a basin and increase aquifer salinity that eventually renders the groundwater unsuitable for use as drinking water or irrigation without expensive desalination. Pauloo et al. (2021)  demonstrate this process for the Tulare Lake Basin (TLB) of California’s Central…

by Peter Moyle A question I get asked on occasion is: Why all this fuss about endangered delta smelt when there is another smelt that looks just the same that can takes its place? The smelt being referenced is the wakasagi (Hypomesus nipponensis), which is indeed similar to the delta smelt (Hypomesus transpacificus). In fact, both…

by Jay Lund, Peter Moyle, and Andrew Rypel This updates a post from December on the likelihood of California entering a second dry year. Normally, a second dry year brings drought operations for California’s overall water system operations. Today, it is even likelier that California is entering a multi-year drought. Precipitation conditions have improved somewhat…