Until the Last Drop | California Water Documentary

140 years ago, California pioneers harnessed the rivers and turned the valley into a garden. Now California is more populated, hotter and drier, and

water

has become more precious. This is where our story begins. In fact, I have never met anyone who farms in the Central Valley. Who doesn't like clean

water

? Abundant wildlife, beautiful natural areas. I think about the rivers we live on here and the farms here. I spent summers going to Tollock Lake, which is part of the Stanislaus River system. I grew up on the river, my parents. My brother and I grew up on the river.

I live on the river and for me it is emotional, in addition to our livelihood. Our water supply comes 85 percent from the Tuolumne River. We take people to tour the system from here. They don't know where the water comes from and are very impressed when they see the large pipelines and treatment facilities, but especially when you enter the national park and see the O'Shaughnessy Dam for the first time, which is actually dwarfed by the majesty of the granite basin behind is an impressive sight and takes people's breath away we were blessed in

california

with the largest source of water in the world the sierra nevadas no one has it like we have it with the fertile land we have climate we have only five places in the world we are just one point on the map with four others to have the climate the soil that we have as I grew up I mean I remember at one point I talked to my dad and I noticed all the channels my dad said something that I didn't forget and if we didn't have these canals, all the places we live would be dust and all the green that you see is because of the canals that you walk through every day and I think that's Well, I mean that one in three jobs in our community comes directly or indirectly from agriculture.

None of that would exist if we hadn't taken advantage of the water that runs through all the irrigation districts of the central valley, if you're going to say something important. about the water in California, you have to expect that someone will not be entirely happy with it for those of you who are not familiar. I mean, I covered this water quality control plan

last

year. The headline we put on the kqd article was the biggest. California water decision you've never heard of. The state water board is looking at the three tributaries that flow into the San Joaquin River and are essentially establishing flow criteria.

The amount of water that should be there for the environment. This is an assault. For farmworkers and their families, virtually all almonds, artichokes, lemons, pistachios and processed tomatoes grown in the U.S. come from that state's headquarters. The investigation argued that diverting the water would put endangered species such as chinook salmon and delta smelt at risk, according to the Hill. It is not sustainable to overdevelop agriculture when you have limited water resources. This is a massive reallocation of one of our most important natural resources. There is no guarantee of any benefit to our communities, our environment, and our farms in this reallocation. water used for agriculture to restore fish populations people have been talking for the

last

two hours in front of the state water board they are fed up they want to see an alternative plan leaders in Merced County are furious with the latest water plans submitted by the The state water board has reached the point that the Merced Irrigation District is planning to do so soon.

The ecosystem needs to feel some of the benefits when we conserve water. I think we are in a fight for our survival. There is no doubt that the conflict over water is something that has been happening. Since Donna's time, the Tuolumne River today doesn't look like it did 150 years ago, so they built the grain dam, completed it in 1893 and in 1904 we started delivering water to farmers in Modesto because that's when we completed the main canal . and then we delivered water to the farmers and that was called the greening of paradise valley and probably the biggest thing that ever happened in California because here with the water that I'm talking about and what those people do, they feed the world with this . product our ancestors were visionaries and had the vision to build don pedro and then the new don pedro a few years later and turn an otherwise arid landscape into the productive agricultural region we have today and in fact it is the fifth largest county productive of the nation.

There's not a lot of naturalness in the way we manage water in California and we make a lot of profit from that and we kind of support a lot of agriculture, most of us wouldn't have our lawns, we wouldn't have our fields, a lot of us. the rural economies of the rural economy would be a lot poorer if we didn't, if we managed water naturally in California, and in terms of water quality, a lot of us would be dead, so as an engineer, I think we should have somewhat proud of what we've done we definitely have some problems in terms of keeping the environment alive people have turned the central valley rivers upside down we've done a lot we've changed the hydrology it's almost the opposite now the river flows we see the flows and ebbs are almost the opposite of what they were historically so in the past we made some decisions based on incomplete information we are learning now that some of those decisions we made need to be corrected why Californians fight over water well fight because or There is not enough or there is too much and both conditions can cause problems when it rains in California, the worst flood in the history of this continent turned the vast central valley into the central ocean in 1862 and We first built dams to help stop those floods and then we We realized that they could also help during dry years because scarcity has its own problems and it is obvious that there are 40 million people in this state, all of them are thirsty and hungry they need water to meet those needs, around 160 000 gallons a year for the typical California family, so you have to have dams to store water for dry days and the drier it gets, the more stored water people want and that creates its own friction.

Extensive gravel mines formed in the canal, uh, some of that was done by gold miners, some of that by people mining and selling aggregate, all of which changes the way the river flows today, it's much deeper , wider and the water moves much slower. than is most conducive to a native salmon fishery, I think right now both rivers are unfortunately dominated by non-native species, obviously that wasn't the case historically because most of our non-natives were intentionally introduced by state and federal agencies . the tuolumne has a larger population of smallmouth bass because the slower, shallower waters we believe the stanislaus has a larger population of bass and stripers 10 20 30 years ago there was a point where they were catching 80 percent of the population available each year in the ocean, what that did was that the salmon returned to the rivers at younger ages, while the salmon usually returned with four fish of five and six years old.

You've all seen the photos of these beautiful big salmon, now they are more likely to survive if they come back as two years old. -years or three year olds because every year you spend in the ocean you have a greater chance of dying and not returning, so you are not going to reproduce, that is why we have artificially selected salmon that returned to the rivers at an earlier age over the last three decades preserving our wildlife having fish in our rivers is the morally right thing to do is the ethically right thing to do and I think the majority of Californians are in favor of it, what we learned along the way is that there are a lot of other species that are also in decline due to the loss of riparian forests in the central valley.

That's what our current water war in the northern San Joaquin Valley is all about. The people who live here have created reservoirs to store much of the river water and now some groups and their allies on the state water board want more of that stored water today is August 21, 2018 at 9:40 a.m. m. and meetings begin if we do not solve the salmon problem in the The Merced River will always be targeted, historically more than 60 to 70 percent of the Tuolumne Stanislaus and Merced flows are diverted between February and June, depriving the delta of the bay and estuary with vital freshwater needed to protect fish.

I am completely convinced that flow alone is not going to solve the problem of salmon recovery. These people came to California and multiplied to 38 million people and dammed the rivers, diverting all the water that you know the planet is warming. Flows of fresh water are needed to produce. I'm sure most people in California get drinking water, but to really solve the problem what really needs to happen is a complete restructuring of water rights to reconsider not just residential use but even more so agricultural use. There are people on both sides of this debate. those who don't want to see any change want to maintain the status quo and there are others who would see our entire communities destroyed to return the river to its native system without diverting water for people or food production and frankly neither Some of Those voices are helpful in this conversation, but I think you have to ask yourself a question: Are we here to find a solution?

Are we here just for people to go ahead and create bureaucracies that go on and on and on and never accomplish anything? The people in the district will be affected in such a way that they will not be able to survive if the bay delta plan goes as they imagine, they are basically asking us to pack our bags and get out of here. This is an agricultural community. A lot of times when you know the state gets involved and thinks they're doing the right thing, there are unintended consequences and I think the unintended consequences of taking a manifest amount of our water or any significant amount that would devastate not only our farmers, but all of us. the workers, all the ancillary businesses that come with it, it would just be devastating.

All you know is important when you have a complex animal that lives in multiple environments for several years. Everything impacts them as a researcher. Look, you know you shouldn't put it in so as not to be too dramatic, but it's actually your life's work. I've been doing this for 26 or 27 years starting here in Sacramento, but I've certainly done more research in the San Joaquin Basin than anywhere else and I see that the government doesn't even question the information, they just leave it out, how do you give it credibility? to government documents and the requirements they are imposing on people?

We need to look at all the rivers and flow into the delta to come up with a comprehensive solution and it's not fair to pick just one river, the Tuolumne, and exclude all the others and, in fact, that's exactly what the state water control board did. water resources with its plant; basically they haven't looked at all the rivers, some of the rivers are we'll look at after they're done with us, although frankly they'll never be done with us, this is one of the breadbaskets of the world, one of the most agricultural regions productive that you will find anywhere and billions of dollars of crops are grown in this area every year, that is the livelihood of the people, the value of the cultural heritage, these communities were founded by people who depended on and built these reservoirs and they worked this land with their own hands, so there is a rich connection between the four of them. the rivers that run through this assembly district and everyone who lives here and the work that goes on here, what do farmers bring to the valley first?

They brought life when they diverted water from rivers to turn a dry desert into the world's largest garden for generations. generation have brought food to the tables of California, but their success has come at a cost, some see them as villains, others as heroes. If you think about your home garden, if you grow tomatoes or something in your garden, you cannot grow them without water. Food does not grow. without water. Water is needed to produce the jeans you wear. Water is needed to produce the phone you are talking on. You need water to do everything. Using water to grow food is, I think, one of the best ways. we can use water, how can you have a farm without water?

It is a myth that there are food plants that do not need water. There are plants that you can choose not to plant every year, unlike a perennial plant, like a walnut, that you must keep. alive, no matter how much production you get, if you want to get a crop next year, even if today's crop fails, you have to apply the same amount of water because you have to keep them healthy for next year's crop, so you can't say it's a year with bad water, many people blame farmers for ruining the rivers and many other people ask if it is true, well, it is a complicated question, but theFood has been grown in California for as long as there have been people.

He longed for the 49ers' get-rich-quick dreams to turn into visions of beautiful farms. All they needed was water to make those visions come true. When John Muir, the greatest conservationist of them all, crossed this valley into the mountains, he called it the most flowery place I've ever walked and he said and this is a quote. Storage tanks should be built at the foot of the mountain range so that all the bounty of the mountains can be harnessed. The water comes out of the tap. It is a miracle. They do not know. Where does it come from?

Where do they get their good food from in the supermarket? Oh, but if I go to a farmers market, a farmers market I can, I can get it from a real farmer, you know a family farmer, you know from a work environment. They know that's the kind of thing they like, they don't recognize that in the Turlock and Modesto area most of the people you meet are family farmers and you know that people don't take the time to get to know and understand them. my name is janie gatesman and my titles would include farmer's daughter farmer's wife mother farm partner and agricultural appraiser I am actually a fourth generation farmer my grandfather who started our family operation that continues to this day in the district of Turlock irrigation the average family farm is less than 40 acres we are not talking about corporate farming these are farms that are often multi-generational these are people who are many of them have a second job but many of them their entire livelihood depends on a supply of reliable and affordable water in a farming family we measure so many important dates by planting dates because almond orchards typically last 20 to 30 years.

I remember when my husband came to my parents' house to pick me up for our first official date, we had just planted that garden and that garden. I'm 20 now, it reminds me that I've been with him for a long time. We got this lease the year the twins were born and planted the trees the year they turned one. The trees are already one year old when you plant them. The trees and the twins are the same age and in this image the twins are one and so are the trees. This lease is for 25 years, so we are very excited that the twins will be 25 years old when this lease ends.

Hoping that this ranch will allow them to attend college, when you look at a garden, you realize how long of an investment it is, especially for young people like my husband and I, who invest a lot of money and a lot of time in this investment. . But when you put it in terms of a child's life, this investment will carry us through the entire childhood of our youngest children. I really think it shows what a long-term commitment farming really is. There was a big drought in the 70's. When I was a child we saw how stressed our parents were because of how bad the water situation was.

This was probably in the mid to late 70's. I knew it was happening. I could see their stress, but when it comes to your own income and your own children. you're trying to feed yourself, so it's a concern if there's not enough. We have about 1900 farmers in the Merced Irrigation District growing over 50 crops, primarily nut crops, tomatoes, corn and sweet potatoes, sweet potatoes, the area where they grow here is one of the only areas in the world, if not the only , where they can be grown organically. I think we have a situation where less than one percent of the population of the United States are farmers, so people don't really do it.

We don't have a good window into the methods used in agriculture and how necessary water is. We're squeezing every last

drop

of efficiency as we can out of the water we're using because we don't want to waste, you know, the lentils. more water than almonds. I've heard it's like that, but you wrap almonds wrong and it just becomes part of the vernacular and you don't, it becomes a fact that people just know it even though they don't really know it. I just heard it somewhere, we use sensors in the soil called soil probes and they send all kinds of electronic data to my husband's cell phone or laptop and tell him where he has dry spots in the soil where the soil might be a little Wetter than us.

In a three-year study, I saw it done in grapes and we actually did it in almonds and they came to me with this and said, hey, look, we want to do something, we're going to put two feet of water in an almond orchard. in January and the normal use for a normal summer growing season is three and a half feet, so we put two feet of water in January and the way we did it was we applied six inches of water every Monday and so on. for four weeks we put six inches of water on Monday and basically the study was to see if it would hurt the trees and the easiest way to answer is that it didn't hurt the trees so we were able to put two feet of water in each January and there is no visible damage, there is no damage to the production, nothing to the trees and you know that when the water reaches the groundwater it disperses, but they were able to say that that water reached the groundwater and therefore, if it reaches the groundwater, it is generating an effect, whether it was a large effect or just a small effect, it had an effect on the groundwater and what they also found because what we were doing is we were using rainwater and that is very comparable to the snow water that we use during our irrigation and therefore filtered and diluted some of the contaminants that were in the groundwater.

There has been a widespread misunderstanding about efficiency in agriculture. The use of agricultural water. The largest or one of the largest sources of groundwater recharge is the return flow from agriculture a few years ago. There was a big environmental organization that had a big report that said you could get three million acre-feet of additional new water by drip irrigation throughout agriculture. They didn't quite understand that those three million acre-feet were already being used. Someone was going to recharge the groundwater for droughts. Groundwater is by far the largest reservoir, almost 10 times larger in the state. For the drought, we have about 40 million acre-feet of total surface water storage capacity in the state, we have over 400 million. acre-feet of storage capacity in the groundwater basins, particularly in the central valley, the amount of water I have to use is governed by the needs of the tree and it doesn't matter how I put the water in the soil that these trees need. what falls from rain plus about three acre-feet of water a year, so if I put it with a flood or a micro-sprinkler or a drip, the tree still needs the same amount of water, the only efficiencies you are looking for or trying prevent evaporation the water just goes into the air instead of the ground we have some drip lines buried the system I have was just the supplemental system it's not enough to support the tree we flood we irrigate this orchard but between the floods i can give them a little boost with this berry drip.

We're looking at how much water stress the tree is under if you're measuring if the water goes down the roots and up through the leaves as the leaves evaporate, it's pulling. The more water rises and the greater the tension, the greater the stress under the tree, okay, the leaf has to go into the chamber, so I put it through this joint, the stem let me see it come out and I tighten the joint . In this chamber we're looking for moisture to start coming out of the cut into the stem and as soon as we pressurize the chamber until we see that happen, we stop and take a reading to reuse this compressed nitrogen to squeeze that leaf out and push, push. the water out of the stem, as soon as I see moisture, I stop and see how many bars it took to do that, so it's four and a half, so I have a chart that the university developed that tells me how.

How much stress is under the tree at four thirty with today's temperature and humidity, so is this tree quite happy? How much water does it take to produce any protein you consume? You need to consume some protein, so where will it come from? of what is the healthiest protein and then if you want to add a water use coefficient per unit of protein, if you compare one type of protein to another, I think that may be more valid than just throwing out, it's a gallon per almond. Installing a well for a ranch of about 40 acres would cost about 150,000, which includes the pump.

Typically, if you are looking for a larger well that produces more water for a larger surface area, it can cost between 500-600,000 here in Oakdale. If you go south, to the valley, where you have to go deeper to get water or deeper to get good quality water, you are looking at a cost much higher than that, every year there are risks for each crop and then you have risks that could exist. Risk things that kill your entire garden and there are risks for the markets. People say: Do you want to go to Las Vegas? I said no.

I face that kind of risk every day. I play for a living. Why do I want to go do it? funny not growing food here would seem like a crime against humanity conditions are perfect as long as there is water generations of farmers have discovered how to turn this valley into a paradise valley some have even called it the garden of eden the father of israel's irrigation movement in The 1890s came here to learn about irrigation. Modern farmers are discovering how to make every

drop

of water go further or at least far enough to grow the most incredible fruits, vegetables and proteins the world has ever seen.

That's why agriculture is a $50 billion industry in California and $12 billion of that comes from the northern San Joaquin Valley, which is fed by the Stanislaus Tuolumne Merced Rivers. We create 80 percent of the world's almonds in California. We create more milk than anywhere else. The best cheese. Peaches of everything. We created it here in the valley, if they don't have water, the only thing they will be able to do with their land is pasture or winter wheat, which is obviously infinitely less profitable than almonds or pistachios, and is the economy of most people. Who lives in modest is based on agriculture anyway, that agriculture is 80% of our economy, so every job, every librarian, every teacher, every post office employee, everything is based on agriculture, If it weren't for agriculture those jobs wouldn't even exist but come on let's not just talk about farmers let's talk about cities cities this is a community that is growing faster than any place in

california

we are on the cusp of changing three rivers that flowed From the Sierra to San Joaquin and into the Delta, Rainbow Trout, Raccoons, Belted Kingfishers, Salmon, and humans depend on them, so it is absolutely vital that we understand how they work and how they don't.

The key is science. My name is doug demko. I am a fisheries biologist and chair of fish biology. we've worked on the Stanislaus River since 1991 and the entire San Joaquin Basin since 1991. You know, we investigate and monitor very intensively 365 days a year all year round. They're monitoring one life stage or another of chinook salmon, rainbow trout. You know, we're definitely seeing questions that we can't answer, but what's more disturbing to me is that many times we don't even recognize what questions we should be answering. We're arguing with new people in new cubicles. that we have never had to do it and we are trying to educate them and they are raising issues that have nothing to do with transfers of water out of reservoirs and it is becoming more and more of an issue that some of the state agencies are doing It is very difficult for us to finish whatever process we need to finish with them, for example the dam project is only intended to identify and count the number of adult salmon upstream.

We had to obtain 14 permits. In fact, we had to obtain permits from entities that I had never obtained. I had heard about them and didn't know they existed. You're getting signatures from people who have never been to the Stanislaus River or the Tuolumne River and spending hundreds of thousands of dollars just getting permits. There was another curriculum that was developed so we did a follow-up study to the 2012 study, so it was enhancing what we did in 2012, which was really innovative work. It was the first study of its kind in the central valley that collected predation rates of predator abundance and then related them to survival metrics.

We tried to do a follow-up study in 2013 and 2014 and were unable to get permits from the fisheries agencies. to do something so crazy that a fisherman could go up to the top of the Tuolney River, catch a rainbow trout, kill it, cook it and I ate it, but a federal agent literally called me and told me not to snorkel in a stream or he would come, I would arrest me and put me in jail, so are you protecting the fish or are you protecting your agency's department?they don't want that information collected, it's easier to get a research permit from a communist government than it is to get a research permit in California, we think they're trying to get to an end point using science, so they choose the studies that they like them because that's where they want to end up and they don't look at our science, they don't respect our science, we're talking about 25 years of data, those are really powerful data sets, what we found. was that over the 15 years we've done it, pulsed flows don't draw salmon upstream like people think they do, like agencies believe they do take the velocity studies that showed the rivers had to flow fast. to help drive juvenile salmon downriver to the delta makes sense, but a virtually identical study two years later showed it was much more complicated than simply flowing salmon need fast water need slow water need muddy water need food and need places to hide The environmental movement and the state had staked all their plans to save salmon on that first study, so they refused to accept the second.

Here is what the exact same scientist did if we can't even agree on the science he will use. It will be impossible to agree on solutions, the tuolumne has always been one of my favorite rivers so it's good to see this agreement happen there. I think it's very significant because, first of all, from the perspective of native fish other than salmon, the tuolumne has always been Although it's a pretty good place, the Tuolumne River is much flatter and much wider. If you think about it, it would be the traditional chinook stream, a stream that will produce a lot of chinook.

At least the river as it exists below the dam today, if the floodplains are not restored, if more marshes are not restored, no more edge habitat flow is restored, it may simply be of no use because it is necessary to have it. a place for these fish to go, if you just put those flows between two big dams and push the fish out to sea, maybe they'll get there a little faster, but they'll be so small that their survival rates will still be very low. We have invested about 30 million dollars in the Tuolumne River, so it would be foolish to think that we haven't learned something and if you are losing 96 of your juvenile salmon upstream in river habitat, the best habitat you still have a section The Ptolemy River still has to go down the San Joaquin and then pass Stockton or Old River and go through the delta.

I mean, really nothing survives and in many years nothing survives outside of these rivers and for the people just. ignoring the problem of non-native predation is simply false, it is crazy and we came up with a program that we felt was more effective in protecting fish than the state water boards plan. The second study that I find absolutely fascinating is a study that was conducted by dr. nan fangi from uc davis and has to do with the thermal suitability of rainbow trout omicus in the tuolumne river, what we found is that through a series of aerobic tests the fish in the tuolumne river are thermally suitable for a threshold of temperature much higher than the 2003 EPA guidelines, so about four degrees, well, four degrees makes a huge difference when you're talking about water supply and water supply is the only way to address temperature in the California River.

The fish are different from northern forms fish and we have shown that they appear to be more thermally tolerant or can tolerate higher temperatures than their colder northern water counterparts. Our data suggest that fish from the southernmost distribution of this chinook salmon extending from omica to some extent are doing quite well at warmer temperatures than we would have expected and warmer temperatures than northern fish, fish from northern populations warmer than those fish can tolerate, so we have evidence that tells us that there is something special about fish from the central valley: it is favorable in terms of its ability to tolerate slightly higher water temperatures , but it is not yet known how high it is.

What do you know? How much do we think that will protect them from a future climate? We call it temperature, the abiotic master factor for fish, they speed up. Temperatures rise as a very direct relationship between the fish's body temperature and water temperature, so a warmer fish will evade predators faster to a certain point, but as it gets too hot their ability to do so will decrease. because you push them outside. from its optimal level, that type of information I think can be very useful when you ask questions about how to spend or waste valuable cold water resources.

We see significant benefit from improving floodplain habitat. You can create a floodplain habitat. You can design it. to contemporary flows, so while right now in the tuolumne river it may take eight or ten thousand cubic feet to flood a floodplain that will benefit native fish in the tuolumne river, if we create floodplain habitat, we can design it down to a lower level. level such that it floods every year or every two years or every three years if reduced to the most fundamental level shows that 90% of the juvenile salmon of the Tuolumne River that come out annually are eaten by predatory species so it doesn't matter what we do to improve fishing in the upper reaches of the lower tuolumne river, if 90% is going to be lost to predation, we are back to square one, so what these restored floodplains do for salmon is they provide habitats of warm water at low velocity for a very short period of time, just a few weeks during the migration period.

It's silly to just ignore the problem and say, "Oh, it's not predators who think you're going to release a little more water." to dramatically improve their survival and you know our estimate was 96 percent right, so what would happen if we were out? What if it was 50? Show me a studio anywhere in California. Show me a study anywhere on the west coast where they found 50 losses of juveniles. fish or any animal during their migration that will be ignored for the last 10 years, turlock and modesto and the city and county of san francisco have attempted to work in good faith with the state water board, the reality is the regulation that the board of water is trying to impose on this community will not solve the problem the problem means a continued decline in returning salmon spawners we are a small piece of the picture we are a small piece of the flow puzzle where a small piece of the salmon puzzle but nevertheless, We are part of the picture, the Merced River is important to our community, but it is also important to our region and it is important to the state as a whole and I don't know if we can restore the river to what it was before I did it.

I don't know if anyone knew what it was before we recognized that we built some dams. It must also be recognized that there was extensive mining on this river, which changed the location of the river, the composition of the river, there are dams up and down. this river in san joaquin there is agriculture in what may or may not have been floodplain areas in the past on this river in the san joaquin irrigation district merced was probably the first proponent to start an initial conversation seven or eight years ago and we tried vehemently to come to a resolution, ultimately we couldn't and then we gave it our best a long time ago based on science based on the best science of the river, frankly, the document talks about there being 1100 fish that would be of increase. that would reach the san joaquín river maybe la merced will get 200 of them and our point was if it is worth destroying an economy for 200 fish we should not be responsible for what we cannot control we will work on the la merced river we will do the restoration that is needed in the merced river, but as the fish come out of the merced river, that's someone else's problem, these fish here are good fish, they have survived a lot and if they go to the ocean and get to the wild and they can come back.

It's amazing what they have, what awaits them, what awaits them down the river. I don't see a path to success the way it's being handled now, we've compromised with the state. in this last round and frankly we're still not moving forward, Stanislaus has a steeper slope upstream near the dam, it has two and three miles of canyon habitat, which is prime habitat for rainbow trout and steelhead. iris, what we found is that Stanislaus has a really strong rainbow. The trout population averages between eighteen and twenty thousand fish per year, much more than the tuolumne. You know, the San Joaquin Basin is the southern extension of stealth rainfall in the United States, so it would make sense that they would have adapted to be able to withstand a little more heat.

Typically ambient temperatures, the flows coming out of the dams are cold and the water, the colder the water is, the further it will go and the more it is, the further downstream it will maintain cool temperatures. Those cold temperatures are where California natives thrive. had a record six year drought, New Malone's was practically empty, the water coming out of there was warm, you know, we saw a lot of fish die because of that, another important point about biological opinion on the Stanislaus River when it came out in 2008 and required more aggressive flow releases by reservoir nymphs.

The biological opinion did not have any data on rainbow trout. There were not, they did not know how many rainbow trout, so a biological opinion is required that declares the species that are threatened in this range. more aggressive water releases but you don't have a basic understanding of the abundance of the species you're trying to protect, it's just a fundamental question and you can't handle something if you don't know how many there are and we don't understand their life history we feel that the science that we've been doing has shown us a lot of things more water is not necessarily better the Stanislaus River is already the most impaired river in the state in terms of impaired flows we have it's already running between 34 and 40 percent how much more do we have to give so that the only real chance that the salmon have is to be trapped in the artificial currents created by the giant pumps of the delta and then they can be rescued and transported in trucks around the delta to San Francisco Bay, the natural methods by which the salmon come out, spawn and then come out in flows are no longer working and no amount of additional water will fix that until the problems of predation, turbidity, lack of food, lack of cover and over pumping are solved.

Hatcheries are a key component of maintaining the fish population, but some groups oppose that it disrupts the native wild population. I would suggest that there probably aren't too many wild salmon; There has been so much crossover with farmed fish because they have been present. for so long that we may have missed the opportunity to take steps to protect the wild native gene pool, but if our goal is to maintain a healthy salmon fishery, we've already seen that hatcheries can be a key component to achieving that for as long as we can. . encourage wild salmon spawning even if they are farmed salmon the better chance we have of maintaining these populations for an indefinite future environmentalists don't like farmed salmon if we were really committed if our number one goal was to help the fishing industry of salmon in the bay area, we would have more and more farmed salmon and you can even do things like take farmed salmon and truck them directly to the ocean so they don't get eaten by predators, the reason why the state take 30 million farmed fish to the delta they throw them in the delta is that they will not survive in the rivers because of the predation problem that they will not recognize they put the fish in the delta they survive they reach the ocean they catch most of At least half of them are caught by the commercial fishery and then the rest goes back into all the rivers along the central valley and that's the key for the Stanislaus and Tuolumne rivers that don't have hatcheries and don't want hatcheries. instead of having local naturally produced fish and instead what we are getting are these red farmed fish in random state from other systems.

The issue is not solved simply by hatchery production because fish released from hatcheries do not necessarily replace wild fish, but can be quite different from wild fish and therefore, if we want healthy ecosystems that support wild native salmon and trout hatcheries won't do that for us hatcheries, in some ways the origin of hatcheries was to supplement fishing and try to increase fish production, but they do. they have some negative consequences, they can, you know, mess with the genetics of wild fish, they are not aperfect solution, it is not unrealistic to think that we can repopulate our rivers with salmon, but they will not be the same salmon that were here 100 or 150 years ago.

The salmon we have today are adapted to a very different type of environment. We are still looking for solutions that allow people to survive, if not thrive. We are looking for solutions so that salmon farmers, people to the west and south of us can live. For that to happen, environmentalists must realize that farmers are part of this solution and farmers must understand that conservationists are not the enemy and we must all recognize how important this is to every person: it is a limited supply of water What is it? Why do we have to be as efficient as possible on both the human and environmental sides?

What will happen to the river in the long term as we continue to have growing populations and continue to be the part of the ecosystem that One of the things that we all find difficult to understand is that we cannot have nature, just be nature in itself, we are part of that nature now, 200 years ago, it was the rivers that shaped the waterways and marshes of the sacramento san joaquín delta that support millions of native fish today the delta is a system of dikes and pumps that 24 million people depend on to drink water. Those pumps can literally reverse the tides by sucking up fresh water that nearly 60 invasive salmon and smelt species compete with to survive, scientists and officials are now desperately trying to undo all the damage that This estuary has suffered.

We ask a lot of the delta, just as we ask a lot of groundwater. We ask a lot of all the state's bodies of water. of California in much of the world, but the delta is kind of the nexus of everything, it's kind of an important center in the system, but there is a fish conflict. Recent work at the state water resources control board has reviewed in-stream fish requirements. flows in the tributaries of the san joaquin there is a school of thought that says that more flow will improve the conditions of the fish and contribute to the health of the delta, but then there is another school of thought that says that if you simply put more water in these Narrow channels are unlikely to provide health benefits to fish.

I am currently vice president of the delta board of directors. It is a state agency that was created in 2009 to coordinate about 200 local, state and federal agencies, all of which have some responsibility or regulatory authority for managing the delta. the largest estuary on the west coast the charge of the delta management board is to restore a healthy estuary, we see this as an emergency room and even someone provides a do not resuscitate order for smelt or salmon or any other species. We are obligated to do everything we can to try to reverse trends, and science is a key component.

Salmon in the delta are a fascinating fish. They don't live in it. delta use the delta as a passage, they begin life upstream in the tributaries of the sacramento san joaquín rivers and, at the point where they are old and large enough to begin moving, they migrate through the delta and spend most of his life in the ocean. What happens to salmon in the delta? The short answer is that they die if it rains too much. Five out of every 100 salmon that swim out of our rivers might make it through the delta to the ocean, but most years it's two, sometimes three, sometimes none per year.

One hundred are eaten by non-native predators It's that simple There are a thousand miles of levees and ninety-five percent of those delta levees are covered in rocks and chunks of concrete that prevent erosion There are pumps on the edge of the delta that can divert 15,000 cubic feet of water per second leave the delta and send it south to desert farms and thirsty cities. The delta in its current condition is greatly altered from what it was 150 years ago, but it is still an estuary. The difference is 150 years ago. Reclamation projects began to create islands for agriculture. 50 to 100 of the delta came together depending on the time of year and provided a large food web for all species, both terrestrial aquatic and bird, in the delta.

Now we have channeled the delta. and reduced the wetted area to five percent and therein lies a huge food web problem for aquatic species, fish, because it is that terrestrial water connection that stimulates food. It's just not happening like it used to. Most of the levees in the delta have been shaken. Call it armor, they are pieces of rock that prevent water from eroding the levees. It really is a flood protection, but it has created a hostile environment for fish that reside in the delta or, as in the case of salmon and steelhead, that traverse the salinity. in the delta is a key issue because obviously with farming on about 500,000 acres of the million acres of land in the delta you can't put salt water on crops and expect to produce much recently, the state water resources control board has been Looking upstream on the Sacramento and San Joaquin Rivers to find additional sources of water that help contribute to many factors, including salinity control, if rocks are removed from the levees, delta islands will be flooded and farmers Owners of those islands will lose their rights. the land and its equipment and its crops, if you turn off the pumps, people in los angeles, riverside and san diego will be thirsty if you reduce the pumping too much, farmers near fresno and bakersfield will not have enough water to grow their tangerines and walnuts and their tomatoes and we will all go hungry if you dredge the delta channels to make them deeper and colder to help the salmon, you extract mercury from the old days of gold mining that flowed from the rivers and poisons all living things. and if you don't let enough water flow into the delta then you let the salt water from the ocean flow up and that ruins even more land we're damned if we do we're damned if we don't the delta is a challenging place for little salmon because we have non-native predators that will affect their route.

There's also a lot of, you know, man-made canals and things where they have to navigate, take a big net and pull out fish in the southern part of the delta. We will find that 80% of the fish biomass is because predation on non-native fish is the big problem, that is the main problem, and the predators are usually invasive species, many types of bass, including striped bass, as well that between 90% and 95% of the salmon would leave this river. or tuolumne or stanislaus don't make it to the ocean because they become fish food, go ahead let me plug it in, put a plug on striped bass as a positive, they've been around since the 1870s.

Totally adapted to our system now, yeah If we suddenly got rid of striped bass, we could see an explosion of other species that really compete with juvenile salmon or we could see an explosion of other predators that channel catfish, for example, or even large moth bass, other predators. could become more abundant because you've eliminated the top dog when you look at the size of the largemouth bass that are harvested in the delta and they've increased over the last three decades, I mean we planted the Florida variety of largemouth bass, the largemouth bass that we had and that were originally planted by the government in the past apparently they were not growing fast enough to grow big enough, so in the 80's we planted Florida variety largemouth bass in the delta and after that time they showed that yes, of In fact, the delta bass is now getting even bigger the delta is probably the most studied estuary in the world we have a lot of data we have a pretty good understanding of how things work it is because of the complexity there is layer after layer after layer of influences on any particular issue The way you select it makes it very difficult to find easy answers.

There are no simple solutions for any of these delta islands. They have been cultivated for 150 years and during that time, due to erosion and oxidation of the peat soils, land subsidence has occurred, causing several of the islands. or bowls in the central delta are now 20 feet or more below sea level, which is unsustainable and delta growers recognize that they do not provide much space for tidal habitat, the types of habitat that the council delta management believes they would be best suited to improve conditions for the native fish population the most important factor affecting salmon in the delta is the starving food supply and the narrow channels we have talked about riprap lack of water connection to land historically reduced floodplain all of these factors diminish the food web, primary food production for salmon and other species that depend on it, so flow matters .

The Delta Stewardship Council believes that if we improve floodplain flooding and breeding habitat and improve the food web, that is most likely. The possibility of improving conditions for salmon and water will be involved in that, but it's a time when it's not volume, you're assuming we can fix the delta first, you have to recognize that when you talk about the delta as the killing fields, We're not really talking about the entire delta, we're talking about the southern and central delta. When you talk about the northern and western delta, you get much better habitat for salmon and in fact they can come down the Sacramento River and come out to sea on the other side in the north in the southern and central delta that's where If a fish that comes out of the San Joaquín River or the Tuolumne or the Stanislaus River gets into that labyrinth of channels where the water is warm where there are many predators of various types, where it is very confusing to be a fish that you go out to see and it is difficult for you. find the way to the sea.

It's ironic that the survival rates of salmon that are recovered at these large pumping plants in the southern delta and then trucked up the main estuary to San Francisco Bay, those salmon have much higher survival rates than fish that you're trying to traverse through the delta, so maybe that suggests a solution: you'll find a way to catch them. catch them as they come down and truck them in at some point if we want to keep the natural flows of schnook salmon upstream healthy, the delta may have to become a migration corridor where those fish pass through as quickly as possible, it's really great if You can get them into the ocean relatively quickly and before it gets too hot, because a number of bad things can happen as it warms up for these salmon, including disease and all sorts of things, trucking salmon across the delta is a compromised strategy because Recognize that getting a juvenile salmon to swim through the southern and central delta is nearly impossible;

Mortality is 99.9 in most years, but to think that you can manage one species, much less multiple species, without having a proper understanding of their life history. it's just nonsense the problem is that no one trusts the delta region no one trusts the government anyway to do what the operating conditions say it will do it's a huge trust problem that the system can be designed and managed to balance the water supply needs and ecosystem health, but operational rules based on the best available science and adaptive management, learning and change are possible, but there are so many conflicting interests and there is so much lack of trust right now and for many years, that makes it very difficult to find solutions that are agreeable to the warring factions and it doesn't get any easier when angry farmers and angrier conservationists start biting each other, throwing huge amounts of money at agriculture of the south and large industries of our cities and the great greens. environmental groups that rely on a crisis to raise money and people who are actually trying to get things done are drowned, so to speak.

I don't think everyone is going to be happy with the delta. I don't think anyone is not completely happy. about the delta, in fact, it is a kind of game of chicken, everyone knows that the current delta is not sustainable, but no one will be the first to volunteer to give up something to achieve a more sustainable future for the delta because that would weaken their negotiations. position is a very difficult and uncomfortable dance and we will see that when voluntary settlement agreements, as well as everything else we do, the state really has to come in and negotiate, kind of like the policeman who comes and breaks up the game of chicken between overzealous teenagers and sports cars the eternal dilemma of california is water where to find it how to share it how to care for the rivers and streams that supply it and everything that depends on it more dams more hatcheries desalination river restoration or maybe something more basic really to us the restoration of rivers has to do with thepeople, is about restoring the function of our river corridors for people, is based on a combination of factors related to the physical conditions, the biological conditions and the social and economic conditions of an area where a community is willing to accept and be able to support river restoration is where it will be successful.

He has had success with a project called Honolulu bar between Oakdale and Knights Ferry on the Stanislaus River. It was a kind of high island in the middle of the river. What we did was tear it down and create a couple of low flow channels for everyone. By creating those low flow channels, you created more spawning areas for the salmon that run through our river and I think what it did is provide those nesting areas. and it has allowed the fish to not be challenged by the high flows and I think this has allowed them a little sanctuary in the river for them to go ahead and lay their eggs and start the cycle again so for us it has been a project very successful.

We have learned a lot about the Tuolumne River. The expenditure of those funds has been invested in about 37 studies and from those 37 studies we have created a series of models that support the operations of the river and predict the benefits to the fisheries that filling the gravel pits were one of the main drivers and The projects we undertook years ago in the 1990s for the special ponds we fill have seen a dramatic improvement in the levels of specific predators in those defined areas. Rancho dos Ríos is 1,600 acres right here at the confluence of the Tuolumne and San Joaquin rivers. and it took about five years, about 21 amendments to the purchase agreement, and nine different financial partners to raise the money to purchase this property for preservation. purposes of a very willing landowner, a very understanding landowner, three years ago we were able to do some work in the floodplains of rancho dos rios where we imitated a flood with our river pumps and placed hatchery fish in the flooded habitat areas of rancho dos rivers and We saw how quickly they grew, they grew at a faster rate than any of the other salmon recorded feeding on floodplains.

Studies that have been carried out in Cosumnes or in Yolo Bypass. We are very excited to know that in the San Joaquin system we can grow floodplain fats. Just as you've heard about in other parts of the Central Valley, proof of concept is a really important part of any wildlife recovery, especially salmon. We have many projects underway, several of which we have California Fish and Wildlife permit applications and are waiting for our projects to be approved. There is a lot focused on predation control and the possibility of erecting dams on river barriers to prevent non-native fish from moving upstream during critical times in the salmon's life cycle, so additional projects are waiting. in the future. but we need the State to give them the green light before we can continue.

My impression is that voluntary settlement agreements are probably our best hope now for having effective environmental management in some of these systems because they provide a more flexible way of combining the management of physical habitat and aquatic habitat together they provide a way to bring together the powers of the stakeholders, the legal powers and the legal resources and the resources of the stakeholders and the regulatory agencies and the environmental management agencies to work together common objectives, so our agreement with the state talks about flows, talks about improvements to the river, so it talks about, for example, improving spawning grounds, it's about predator control, so it's basically a whole set of options and I think we're talking about spending $38 million on these actions, so the point is that it will happen immediately if we come to an agreement, so that it is better for all concerns and it is about finding the right balance between what is good for the people and what is good for the fish and the other habitats, okay, you know, once again, related to science and everything else, we can start this right now, and we don't have to wait any longer, because the longer these settlements take, we won't do anything that's a benefit for the fish san francisco has a lot of political influence a lot of people listen when you speak san francisco but we are partners in the river with turlock and modesto we have been working with them for decades you know our mutual needs there involves us working with the districts to spend 25 million dollars over the last 10 years in scientific studies to understand the Tuolumne River and try to figure out what is best for the river in terms of the environment and most efficient for the river in terms of use. our water there, San Francisco has a big interest in that, we hope the voluntary agreement works, but we have to protect our interests and if we end up having to go to court, we have to go to court, I don't want to, but it has to do what you have to do also when you're talking about threatening the water supply of 2.6 million people in the bay area, you better have a really good staff because you know the people in the bay area will jealously protect their water.

They are going to protect our water too and they just don't have a clue, the water board staff often don't have a clue so it will be a nightmare for them if there is no voluntary agreement, we don't need to choose between a clean environment and healthy. river and a strong economy that there are paths to move forward together and that's really what we should be working on this notion that it should be one for the other and you find extremes on both sides, you find people who deny or ignore the real world impacts in the habitat in and around these rivers and then on the other hand you talk to some people who live in the bay area and they draw water from a faucet and pick up their food at Whole Foods, I guess they think it grows there in the From my perspective, we have to keep our eyes on the prize, we have to focus on the outcome, but if we can reach an agreement between the environmental community and the water suppliers to use the assets, the flow, the non-flow measures and financial assets. that are on the table now and focus on the goal.

I think we can continue doing good things. We have learned so much over the last decade about this river that it must be integrated into any agreement we reach, for example, we are learning a lot. about the interconnectivity of the food web and how floodplains are so important in giving young salmon a place to hide and a place to grow large enough to be able to distinguish across the delta, which is really just a minefield of areas for them. to be consumed by non-native predatory fish there are many people in the bay area who are strong environmentalists.

I am a strong environmentalist. Many people I work with here at Puc are also, but we have a greater responsibility. We have to provide water and we have to take care of the environment and that means being as efficient as possible in both. The correct way to resolve a problem is through voluntary agreements in negotiation. Water is not a partisan issue that we can't think about. With republican or democratic glasses, we have to be able to talk to people who don't live here and we have to be able to take them to those supermarkets and show them how much their consumption depends on our lifestyle if you really care about yourself you like having almond milk in your coffee with milk if you really like to eat that delicious cheese that depends on securing water resources in the central valley we have to defend it present that case and show people that there will be some reductions in agriculture in the San Joaquin Valley when we look at the implementation of the sustainable groundwater management law, that represents a loss of an average of about 1.8 million acre feet per year, that is, about 600,000 acres of land that are leaving production, you don't want to just take out those 600,000 acres in batches because you'd be taking out too many almonds and not enough low-value crops, so I think water markets are essential to making all of this work now that the negotiations on the voluntary program The agreements seem to have stalled and many people wonder if the process is working well.

The only alternative you have is to go to court and fight over who has the strongest, oldest, strongest or most imperative right to use the water. about as fair as it gets to be a court-ordered all-or-nothing solution that destroys the economy of a million residents of the northern San Joaquin Valley or allows the plight of salmon and other fish in the river to worsen, but the problem is us. We are trapped in a world where your gain is my loss and water rights have dictated everything and those who choose to improve the situation have ignored water rights and that is really what the state water board did, simply instead of respect the water rights of people who have built livelihoods and communities on those rivers that they chose to just take and when one side just takes it it doesn't leave room for compromise and consensus and the opportunity for everyone to work together for the benefit of everyone, the rivers and the communities together in this Part of this is really knowing what these rivers do and what the alternatives are for farmers and for fish.

My feeling is that the best thing I can always do is get out there and get wet and get out on the river and see what it's like to experience the flows. Recognizing that the living river is really something very special, getting people like water users, resource users, team up with government agencies and environmental groups to do the work cooperatively to build trust When people come here and see the work that the irrigation districts do in the San Joaquin watershed, they can spend time on the river and see the commitment they have made and the millions of dollars they have been spending in many districts.

Well, I think you get a new and better understanding of how committed private entities and resource users are to being stewards of the river, we can't find ways to move forward together and I think on the other side of that debate is the notion of agreements and voluntary agreements that have been seen throughout the state of California in different waterways and that is where the focus really needs to be here. In fact, we are not going to decrease the populations of these communities in the San Joaquin Valley. They are going to increase because the cost of living in San Francisco, San Jose and Los Angeles is becoming more expensive and unaffordable, frankly, for most people and that is driving population growth, so how do we restore habitat? of the river but we also provide enough water for these communities and enough water to feed the farms that feed America.

I don't think we're asking too much of the river. I think we fall short when we describe the river and water in California as a scarcity problem. Intelligent humans are intelligent and we are social creatures, when you put a bunch of brains together you come up with some good solutions, so yes, rivers have been taxed, we know that, but we also know that we have solutions within our reach. Rancho dos Ríos is a proof of concept that we can do much more with the limited resources we have, it doesn't have to mean closing an entire component of the system or closing an entire community that depends on the river, some people would say well let's just give up they.

I tend to think that's not right. With a properly managed and well thought out portfolio over a period of perhaps a few decades, I think that is what it takes to find out what the fish really need and what the best way is to provide it to them and what business and organizational model we can develop that will sustain that many Sometimes the technology needed to manage water for any purpose is not that elaborate, but the hardest part is always the people who know how to do it. Do you organize people and get enough people to pay in the right places at the right times so that you can in an organized way provide that water, provide that infrastructure, provide that habitat that is necessary for the crops to continue to grow or the fish to continue to grow or the birds?

We talk about this a lot at River Partners. This is urgent. We have created corridors and the results are amazing and impressive. There's a lot more work to do, so we're trying to address that to create meaning. of urgency about the work that needs to be done. I am hopeful that within 10 years we will have a regional permitting approach that will allow for larger scale habitat restoration projects and that within 10 years we will have begun to see improvements in diet. network and hopefully the resulting conditions primarily for salmon, but what we are learning as this solution process continues is the interconnectivity and how we are all linked in the delta and certainly the delta has many things that shouldfixing to get our salmon back into the tuolumne river having a reliable, healthy and safe food source that is domestic is really important as we enter a new world where pandemics and other health issues and huge populations are becoming More of a challenge, we have to have food available and the supply chain. of food, the food production that happens here and what happens with this water, so I guess when you ask me, you know, does the entire state have a responsibility to make sure that this area has what it is?

Yes, we all have a responsibility and Once again, that is part of having a common future and working together to achieve it instead of continuing to fight for division and stealing water, but absolutely all of us would like to do better and what is that difference of that we are always dissatisfied with where we are and not? being happy about being the best on the curve is what makes California a really great place as a dynamic economy in a society and so I would hate for us to lose that and become complacent, so to some extent I hope that we continue to fight for that because That will help us continue to improve, but we are going to fight for it, instead of fighting a fight that takes away people's water or frees them of their water rights, we should figure out how to create a world where everyone have confidence that people are not afraid to share because in today's world no one is going to share bringing together people who want to see the other side succeed, that means farmers and agricultural interests walk into a room and They want to see the side of moderate environmentalists.

The groups are successful and that means moderate environmental groups come into the room with farmers and want to see their way of life continue and their farms prosper. We have no interest in deciding who gets this drop of water and who gets that one, but we are here. What we need to do is restore river corridors to benefit people in the environment, that is our mission. Our whole focus is on imagining how things could be better and trying to encourage others to join us. We have a government office right now that has publicly stated that we must encourage voluntary agreements we need water districts farmers environmentalists cities counties to get everyone together and put solutions into play that benefit everyone I know we can do it but it can only happen if the political leadership continue to force it because otherwise organizations cities districts people with financial problems Considerations Environmentalists who do not want to compromise are going to fall back into the habits of litigating and fighting and litigating and fighting does not get us anywhere does not improve the habitat does not improve security of the economy in this area that we have To improve the debate about whether we are going to give up something in exchange for wildlife recovery is a construct, it is artificial and when people meet each other and actually start talking about where they come from and Where would you like to go together?

It is clear that we all want to go to the same place. Our hands have worked hard to turn this valley into a garden that feeds the world so that it continues to grow. We must continue teaching others to care for and protect it while they work with it. When we put our rivers and our valley in younger hands, they must know that without these rivers there is no valley and that is why