Tag: Amber Manfree
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Episode 2: “Unraveling the Knot” Water Movement in the Sacramento-San Joaquin Delta – Tidal Forces
By William Fleenor, Amber Manfree, and Megan Nguyen Tides are the biggest driver of Delta flows, and in Episode 2 we look at their impacts in different locations under a variety of inflow conditions. Tides have a twice-daily cycle in the region, with a range of about six feet at Martinez. In the first part…
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Floodplains in California’s Future
by Peter Moyle, Jeff Opperman, Amber Manfree, Eric Larson, and Joan Florshiem The flooding in Houston is a reminder of the great damages that floods can cause when the defenses of an urban area are overwhelmed. It is hard to imagine a flood system that could have effectively contained the historic amount of rain that…
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Reconciling conservation and human use in the Delta
By John Durand, Peter Moyle, and Amber Manfree In a previous blog, we presented a Grand Scheme for habitat conservation in the North Delta Arc (the Arc). This follows up on our earlier broad vision for recreating a Delta more friendly to its native species. In this essay, we give philosophical and historical reasons to approach…
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Episode 3: “Unraveling the Knot” Water Movement in the Sacramento-San Joaquin Delta – Managing Flows
By William Fleenor, Amber Manfree, and Megan Nguyen Delta water diversions have significant effects on flows and water quality within the Delta. Diversions can re-direct river flows and draw salt water inland from the sea, impacting water quality and the environment. Episode 3 explores how water diversion quantity affects in-Delta flow directions and quantities. This…
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Episode 1: “Unraveling the Knot” Water movement in the Sacramento-San Joaquin Delta
By Bill Fleenor, Amber Manfree, and Megan Nguyen In 2010, John DeGeorge of RMA, Inc used animated model results to illustrate specific flow and water quality issues in the Delta to the State Water Board. The Center for Watershed Sciences, working with John and using RMA software, has assembled a series of narrated animations to…
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Shadow theater and data management for the Delta – a video
By Amber Manfree Data and data management are persistent concerns for the Delta and California water more generally. Data Wars: A New Hope, a shadow puppet play on the subject, was shown at the 2016 Bay-Delta Science Conference in Sacramento. The challenge of the Conference’s theme, “Science for Solutions: Linking Data and Decisions,” is illustrated…
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The North Delta Habitat Arc: an Ecosystem Strategy for Saving Fish
Peter Moyle, John Durand, Amber Manfree. Center for Watershed Sciences, University of California, Davis. Delta native fishes are in desperate condition. Over 90% of fish sampled by diverse means belong to non-native species. Native species such as delta smelt are on a trajectory to extinction. If we are going to reverse this trend, we need…
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Napa County strings together a ‘living’ river
By Amber Manfree In the historic heart of Napa Valley, a moderate climate and alluvial soils deposited by the Napa River create perfect conditions for world-class cabernets. An acre of vines here sells for around $300,000, or 25 times the state average for irrigated cropland. Yet a group of landowners have ripped out 20 acres…
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Drought journal: Search for Sierra fish goes from bad to worse
Is the drought hastening the decline of California’s native fish? Will they be able to recolonize once normal conditions return? To help find out, a team of researchers with the UC Davis Center for Watershed Sciences are taking the pulse of about 70 streams and rivers across northern and central California this summer, examining habitat conditions…
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Planning for the inevitable at Suisun Marsh
By Amber Manfree and Peter Moyle In Suisun Marsh, it seems, you can go back in time. You get a haunting sense of the vast marshes that once dominated central California’s lowlands. Sloughs flush with tule perch and Sacramento splittail bend back on themselves. Flocks of red-winged blackbirds rise from thickets of cattails and rushes with…