What the megadrought means to the American West
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- čas přidán 6. 06. 2024
- Farmers dependent upon water from river systems in the American West are seeing massive cuts in their supply, as reservoirs drop to their lowest levels due to the worst drought to hit the region in 1,200 years. Correspondent Ben Tracy talks with scientists who say there is no quick or easy recovery, and with a California farmer whose livelihood is in danger.
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Sam Kinison had it right twenty years ago. "You live in a desert. You know what it's going to be 100 years from now? A desert!"
Worldwide humans are farming more more cities worldwide smog burning air sky 07 think
Stop building golf course communities in the damn desert.
Preach it
Farms use 60 to 70% of all the water in the city people 10% factorys 12% parks and golf and hotels use the last 8%
@@thesilentone4024 Farms feed people at least
@@thesilentone4024 If there were no farmers, you wouldn't be eating.
@@janyceparks8326 yes but there's no reason 1 state should grow enough food for all 50 states spread it out thats all im trying to say.
Sorry if it came out rong
I've lived in Vegas for many years. They knew this was possible even a decade ago and chose to ignore it and keeps building houses here in the desert!!!
They STILL have their hands over their ears and humming....hoping it will go away....by NEXT MONTH.......
Twilight zone episode where 3 gold bars buy one sip of water. Lol stupid humans. It came true
@@ron78tht74 Going that direction, certainly. There are wars being fought over water in more than one area. Have another six babies, folks! Likely the most irresponsible thing you can do.
They are doing it in North Texas, too, knowing we will have a water shortage in 2050. Swimming pools behind every new house, and they want to dam up a small river in Hopkins County to create a shallow lake with high evaporation rates that will destroy farms and ranches in North Texas. So, to feed the indulgence of rich immigrants from California and New York, they are declaring a "public necessity" to take farms and ranches by eminent domain, so the rich people in North Texas communities can indulge themselves with resort hotels and backyard swimming pools.
i agree with you, i too lived in henderson for 13 years, but its just not LV, but LA, phoenix and many who move west
No more almond farming in California sure would help
They are slowly tearing out the Almond trees 👍
I like Plants and Fungus.
But weed's coo...
and gavin screwsom cut the budget to fight the illegal pot farms
the guys running the farm have guns on them all the time and shoot at people driving buy and the worst part is the workers are only there to save there familys back home from the cartels there slaves
YAY GAVIN SCREWSOM
almonds arent the problem its the drug cartels from mexico and there illegal pot farms using 1000s of gallons a day and pumping it full of chemicals that are getting in to the ground water and poluting it thank you gavin screwsom
Stop watering golf courses and meaningless water fountains as decoration in front of buildings, California!
Also water parks
the drug cartells use way more water and they get it anyway they can they will pump your well dry they steel water from your tank and if you have a buisness with a water spicket outside they will hit it everynight till you cant aford to pay your water bill or remove the spicket
THANK YOU GAVIN SCREWSOM
And Nevada, Arizona, etc.
Worldwide humans are farming more more cities worldwide smog burning air sky 07
Melenated - the fountains use recirculating water. The same water goes round and round, no new water.
For how many years have we known this inevitability would happen? Since John Wesley Powell. Water...it's no longer plentiful. These farmers are farming the desert. Las Vegas still wastes water. Leaving this issue to politicians who deny climate change is a mistake.
Desalinization will solve this or a water pipeline from the Great Lakes. We have the technology to solve this problem i'm sure a heavy water tax to build something is coming if you want to live out west! We can go to mars we can solve this! These states have to work together to solve the problem and California is the greatest problem with huge population and little to no water in Southern California so they import it from the Colorado river.
Climate change is not the problem. Las Vegas is a desert. The problem is that climate hasn't changed. It's still a desert and there's still no water.
Wasting water is also not climate change. It's bad management.
90% of these "droughts" in the West are really just bad management. The other 10% is stupidity.
So let's not pretend that a lack of water in the desert is some new thing caused by people driving SUV's.
@@FuKYuClown we won't let you suck our lakes dry for your vanity projects in the desert
Not "climate change", but rather climate CYCLE. Climate change is a pseudo-scientific CULT based in political theory rather than science. Problem is, the climate cycles are long-lasting and very real dangers being ignored because of POLITICS based in collectivist theory.
The climate has been changing since the beginning of Earth.
and yet, people keep moving to phoenix, where it's 110 degrees every day in the summer. and the city is a sprawling monstrosity highly dependent on cars. i don't get why people keep moving to phoenix, or las vegas, or los angeles. they're not even well designed cities. just hot, spread out messes.
Not to say they are stupid, but they are uninformed/ignorant of the lay of the land/hydrology etc.
We moved to Vegas/Henderson in 06 and loved it. Lived there for 9 years then had to move back to Calif. Please explain my ignorance? I was very well informed before I made the move. Vegas is very well laid out. As for the heat I am back at Yosemite and there isn't much difference. Talk about uninformed!!
They are in denial or closed minded. I don’t get it
@@outdoorfreedom9778 👎🏻🤣😂🤣👎🏻
They move here because it doesn't rain. See vid above.
Why is this alarming? Those reservoirs were built long before the huge population growth. It's like building a 100 room hotel, having 1000 guests move in over time, then blame the lack of room on the original construction.
Exactly. 1930, LA basin has 1 million people. Hoover dam finished. 2021, >10 million. This has been repeated all over the west, yet no one ever talks about this like population has nothing to do with it. Willful denial.
Great analogy
Cloud seeding, the main type of intentional weather modification, began in the late 1940s. The basic idea was to use aircraft or rockets to inject silver iodide or another substance into the atmosphere to mimic ice nuclei. The amount of rain or snow a cloud can produce depends on a balance between the number of ice nuclei inside it and the amount of water available to grow around those nuclei. Clouds often lack naturally occurring ice nuclei, so injecting them with silver iodide particles (which are very similar in structure to ice) increases the number of nuclei. This makes the clouds more efficient at generating ice crystals that either fall as snowflakes or melt to produce raindrops, depending on temperatures in and beneath the cloud. Cloud seeding is also used to disperse fog banks near some airports.
A more recent cloud-seeding technique is to use hygroscopic (water-attracting) particles such as potassium/sodium chloride to provide "seeds" for large droplets that fall more quickly, colliding with smaller droplets on the way and accelerating rainfall development.
It's not a population growth issue. It's a water misuse issue. There should be no flood irrigation, ever. There should be no rice grown in the CA central valley.
@@davidk7544
No, if you like nature on any level, population IS the issue. Nature and huge human populations and all their development never coexist. Dams destroy rivers and the development kills everything else.
Stop building in the desert. They need to put a moratorium on building all new housing, especially high-rise apartments/condos in drought areas knowing there won't be enough water to sustain them and we need that water for crops to sustain those areas as well as most of the country. Half of the almond trees have been dug up as there's not enough water to sustain them. That's a wakeup call.
Worldwide humans are farming more more cities worldwide smog burning air sky 07
How are we going to make this happen? The population in the desert SW is booming. People want to move there, and no politician has to nerve to say no to them. Any politician that put such a piece of legislation would be committing political suicide. As for state ballot measures, such a law (even if all the facts why it needed to be passed were clearly laid out) would almost certainly be shot down. People tend to vote with their hearts more than their minds. As it happens, I agree with you, but I just dont see it happening.
If this keeps up we’ll have another dust bowl sweep the country.
That's a scary thought
It sure will happen sooner than later and will be longer, dryer, and more troublesome. And will affect 1/3 of America and will have drought "refugees" within the same borders.
Worldwide humans are farming more more cities worldwide smog burning air sky 07
"This is gonna end their dream, too."
If we run out of water, it will end everyone's dream.
Worldwide humans are farming more more cities worldwide smog burning air sky 07
In upstate N.Y., we are getting dumped on by rain. I haven't seen this much rain here in years. My family's farm was foreclosed on in the 1990's, I am still working on reclaiming what's left. I wish the farmers out west all the best. Farming anywhere has it's challenges.
Hamburg, NY here
Yup, live in Buffalo, NY - raining alot and some places actually got flooded!
@@sierrachoco5271 Q: Do you think Brown will accept Carl Paladino's endorsement ? Will Brown get re-elected ?
@@aaa7189 Good questions. I don't think Brown wants anything to do with Paladino because of his track record. I am hoping Brown is re-elected because Walton has no real experience. Remains to be seen!
@@sierrachoco5271 Go to Geo Engineering Watch channel. It's sad what's going on but people are either ignorant thinking the government cares or evil.
We’ve pooped in our nest for far too long...now paying the price!
exactly
@morgielivie Sounds to me like he has a pretty good handle on it, actually, the cause anyway, which is all he addressed. Do you drive cars (or ride in resource driven vehicles, which is all of them), or eat meat (especially fish), or buy any products that are transported across the county, country, or world? Do you even know which products they are? Do you drink water, and/or poop? Do you live in a house? Is that house air conditioned, or heated, or lit? How many kids have you had, or intend to have? Zero would be the best option. If you've had more than two, you have no right to speak to ANYONE like that, now you are a MAJOR contributor to the problem, in the absolute worst aspect.
You are very much contributing too. We ALL are, to differing degrees. It is virtually impossible not to contribute now. I always find it humorous when people like you think they are outside of the problem, ragging on others. There are some things you can do to help, and hopefully you do, but even if you ended yourself right now, you would be contributing even through that action.
Actually making water more expensive, which is inevitable, will likely DECREASE its use, but profiting off of a natural resource is beyond lame, that I will agree with. Problem is, transporting or piping water to places that need it will make water much more expensive, even without the profit aspect thrown in. And why shouldn't people building those pipes or transporting that water (or any resource) make some profit? Do you expect them to do that for you for nothing? Good luck with that. Not a sustainable business model, then nothing is transported.
And "America", singled out for whatever reason, while one of the most resource intensive countries in the world (which is one good one), has actually invented, introduced, and dispersed several technologies that very much address some of them. Too little, too late, in many areas, but that too is true for all of us. Much of what we have done is irreversible. The only viable way to address many of these problems is to RADICALLY lower global populations, good luck with that, too. Do you pick which ones? Do I? Do govts? See the basic problem?
Even solar energy is not remotely free. Again, production of panels, inverters, etc. Transportation of those panels, often from China now to the rest of the world, is not even remotely free, energy and resources (though sand, a major one, is pretty cheap and available) are required to produce them. Also they are not non polluting (you have to dispose of them too, at end of life). I think they are a BIG part of the 'solution', though, or at least the reduction of the impacts of common current energy production.
We had nothen to do with it if it was worse 1000 years ago
Not yet
No, we've simply become addicted to "chicken little" climate change claims and ignored the REAL and LONGER LASTING problem of climate CYCLES. That said, the single most destructive force in our society today is large cities. Super-concentrated population centers are the cause of most of our issues, both environmental and social. Mega-cities exist for the benefit of industry and government, not for the general population.
It takes one gallon of water to harvest one almond.
And it takes how many gallons a day to support one illegal alien?
@@TisiphonesShadow A climate analysis (I forget the reference ) said that about the year 2030 the Middle East will become uninhabitable with temps in excess of 145 deg F for over 45 days per year. I can’t even imagine where those folks are going to go too live…
Ok, fair enough, but how much water does it take to produce an amount of beef equal to one almond? Check it out for yourself...you'll be surprised. Beef production is way more water intensive pound-for-pound than almonds.
I attended a scientific climate change conference in 1995 as a part of my doctorate. They were 100% correct as to what would happen. Their error was timing. It’s happening 30-50 years sooner than they thought. They predicted that everything from the Rocky Mountains to the Pacific Ocean would burn. At the time I thought that ridiculous. Not anymore.
@cali gdp it’s actually not that hard to model. They use the same technique as weather forecasting. It took decades to get computers fast enough to give a prediction before it happened. But since the average global temps have increased, the initial conditions are no longer realistic. In addition the real behavior of the atmosphere is now different than before, there is no historical data to anchor the models. Anchoring means having a known solution to compare it to. For instance: hurricanes are blowing up from a 3 to a 5 just before landfall. That behavior has never been seen before. We don’t know why or how it happens, so we can’t predict it. This is also why the weather forecasts aren’t accurate now: they say 1” of rain, we get 5”. It’s jokingly called the “butterfly effect”.
I love a farmer complaining about lack of water in front of nut trees that use a disproportionate amount of water.
One pound of almonds takes 1900 gallons of water to grow. California is expected to grow 3.2 Billion pounds this year.
Do. The. Math.
That and avocado trees too!
Do you eat nuts?
@@redrock3109 Irrelevant to the discussion. 80% of the almonds grown in California are for export.
@@SouthValleyComputers So what about the 20% You've never eaten any of those?
@@redrock3109 Perspective, Red Rock. I can live without them. They do appear in my rocky road ice cream. Although it's not like I demand it. And almond "milk" is just immoral. Have I eaten an almond in my life, yes. Have I dramatically cut back since discovering their absolute waste of water yes. Exporting them so farmers can make money... uh, no.
Let's negotiate. Make exporting almonds out of the US illegal. Whatever America eats, great. At least that way, the water helps America. Let the rest of the world grow their own. It's almonds. Not wheat, not corn. Almonds.
It was a bad idea to build a city on a desert to begin with. Heat waves and heat islands are becoming more common.
Worldwide humans are farming more more cities worldwide smog burning air sky 07
Yes it was but unfortunately humanity, collectively speaking, lacks foresight.
Don't kid yourself, it doesn't end here.
Someone once told me, time is a flat circle. Everything you ever done Or will do, you’ll do over and over again. That is the terrible secret fate of all life.
@@joed7185Interestingly, i met a chain-smoking detective down in Louisiana a few years ago who said the exact same thing! He definitely isn't a people person but he did make a lasting impression on me. Anyway, wherever he is i hope he's in a good place.
Gates is ready with his soylent
Fungus food
Nourished by recycled purple people eaters
Did that California farm plant a cover crop on that dry field? If he doesn’t, the hot dry Santa Anna winds later this year will blow the farm field top soil away just like the Dust Bowl Days in Oklahoma.
Remember the mistakes from history or be buried by them!
He should rent out the fallow field to John Cougar for his Melon Camps. (sorry- couldn't resist)
James Hanson, no water = no cover crop
Now wouldn't that be a cruel irony. During the 1930s, Midwestern farmers moved to California because they lost their farms to the Dust Bowl. Now California farmers may lose their farms for the same reason. I wonder if the descendants of the original Okies will move back to Oklahoma because of this?
Meanwhile California aqua ducts are full, can we have a honest conversation about who owns all the water rights? California has plenty of water.
Although we need to conserve, the next question is, do you want a green lawn or rather have food in the grocery stores at a affordable price? I personally like to eat.
Yes. He should put something there. Even if it's gunny sacks or tarps. Me grandma lived the dust bowl.
We have to change the way we are farming. If the farmers cant grow food they can plant milkweed. Its drought resistant and it will keep the soil from blowing away. We need to end Monoculture Farming
I lived in Coupeville, Washington State, USA for 15 years and they dry farm everything. One farmer grows pumpkins and heirloom squash without irrigation. I am worried about that soil blowing away too. There's probably a good hemp crop to plant! Hemp is probably the answer for deforestation. When they slash and burn the rainforest all the soil washes away and hemp can probably grow there.
humans brought water to a place it did not naturally belong. Now we are freaking out because the water is disappearing?? It makes no sense to me
Yea, guys listen to the kid who runs a Minecraft CZcams channel. Surely he knows the intricacies of agriculture better than a seasoned, generational farmer! Just drink your g-fuel, and stay in your block house.
@@Jajaky Im not a Kid, im 28. Also dont assume because i made Minecraft Content im an Idiot. I made a lot of money of Minecraft and it was the greatest business decision of my life. I got 2 Batchelors Degrees in Biotechnology and Genetic Engineering/ Computer Science with that money and have a healthy amount of money in Stocks and Crypto. I work because i want to. I can retire if i want to and its all because at 18 i made Minecraft videos.
Also i have been growing plants all my life and is truely a pation of mine and i also have Certifications in Permaculture Agriculture and Regenerative Agriculture.
@@Jajaky go fly a kite bro. Or better yet. Don’t you have a field to plow or some poison to spray
So remind everyone how 100 years ago we had a severe drought! So bad its known in History as the DUST BOWL!!!!!
This is actually worse than the 1929 dust bowl drought.
Yes it's bad . But still need to feed people . Or chaos. Vegas , Phoenix, LA overbought & overbuilt. Scary how low that lake is .
@@dougtheviking6503Over built, that's the californians moving to your state and taking over.
We as Americans need to start plating and eating foods for the seasons. We should not be eating fresh strawberries in the winter. Also West We need to start growing plants that can sustain droughts and not needing fields and orchards to be flooded to grow. Stop eating and growing nuts...its just a waist
Dude lets talk cars and how much driving is happening across America and the world now i want you to think of how many bugs and animals like wolves and foxes and smaller animals before cars and how between moronic kids cars in general and the minute things across our nation is dying out not just in the western side of America and dont worry by 2038 the bread basket of America will be under water by the eu climate report so if thats any case thats the least of your concern as your already dead
Benjamin, I share your concerns. Let me update this for you. Regenerative farming and vertical farming are our future-it's the only sustainable, responsible way forward. Regenerative farming saves and builds more fertile soil. With vertical farming we have 90% savings in water use, you can grow almost anything well- year-round. Yes including those delicious strawberries. All of what I mention will also help save our planet. It's the direction we must go- no options.
No, you need to start using way less water! ONLY take one, five minute shower every other day! Switch to zeroscape(get rid of your lawn or spray paint it green)!
Growing strawberries is not the same as growing wheat or corn. Strawberries can be grown indoors. Wheat and Corn, not so much.
@@jacoblaughbon3323
Farmers tend to grow what is going to make them the most money.
I am no expert on farming, but I know this much.
Plowing the 'fallow' field like that guy does destroys the topsoil, by 2060 there will be no topsoil to grow food from.
We do the plowing in Europe for hundreds of years,it does not take the topsoil out,it keeps the nitrogen into the earth and makes place for the water to get into the soil when it rains.Plus, it keeps the weeds at bay.We use way less weed killers because of that.And we almost never have invasive species unlike many places that do not do that..
How about stop wasting water on golf clubs country clubs and resorts
Fifty years ago as a kindergardener in Great Plains, we were taught to respect and use only the water needed. Much of the recreational water in the west by homeowners could be changing if water prices increased substantionally via market pricing or federal taxes. It worked for gasoline.
No it didn't. We drive more now than we ever did in the 1960s as suburbs and cities sprawl so we can't get to stuff without driving there. And unlike the fuel economy cars of the 1970s, we are now driving gas guzzler SUVs and pickup trucks with most families owning 2 even 3 vehicles than when I was a kid. $35-$45 a tank isn't stopping anyone these days.
Huh? Your house didn’t have grass?
Your schools- just dirt everywhere? Or some rather large trees that are rather old. I am familiar enough with farms that most have one side of trees as a wind break. Those grow without water too huh? I bet if we charge them more they won’t have them- those luxuries
@@seriouslyreally5413 if only we had some way- someone smart enough to figure out how to move a vehicle forward without oil or gas/petroleum
You would think we have enough smart peopke
@@troystewart7730 are you new? there are entire regions out West with zero grass. ZERO.
@@RobertMJohnson lived 54 years in Washington state
Half is all ag
West side are cities. So- grass is not a large crop here sorry.
Most folk settling out west never had that set of information to contemplate, while many others simply would ignore the warning signs if they had it in front of them.
others are the GOP voters, ignoring is build into their genome
HOMEOWNERS NEED TO STOP PUTTING LAWNS AROUND THEIR HOMES AND INSTEAD, USE XERISCAPING (GRAVEL) AND A FEW BUSHES. WE'RE USING FAR TOO MUCH WATER SO WE CAN HAVE GREEN GRASS IN OUR YARDS !!!
Yes correct or replace the yards for homegrown food crops
@@RugbyFootballer Agreed. We should be maintaining food, not green grass
@@RugbyFootballer then start doing it
@@Sensoredcensored then start doing it
@@claudiaslover4911 It’s against the law in my area to grow a garden in my front yard. I would be fined and the homeowners association could take my house but I’d still have the mortgage. But thanks for the suggestion
The farmer at the end provides jobs, but most importantly, he provides food for a lot of us.
The farmer isn't the corporation. THAT'S what provides food on the table.
@liam Anderson Yes. And the Farmer is not the head of the supply chain. He is in fact at the end, waiting for Haeber process ammonium sulfate to start his crops.
jobs?? for who Mexican migrant workers?? is that what our tax payers money goes???
ALL of US eat !
Mike
YOU GO PICK FOOD & LIVE where The WORKERS LIVE
In Israel we've managed to turn the Negev desert (a permanent desert till then) into a highly fertile land producing much of our produce. ,Much of it thanks to desalination of salty sea water (separating the water from salt).
If my memory serves, about 50% of Israel's drinking water is desalinated.
Plus, our water is highly recycled, with grey water (used water) being used for agriculture.
Then there is the dripping system, watering crops drop by drop so as not to waste water to strong sunlight.
The power for desalinating (and transferring) water can come from solar farms (another Israeli development).
Some practical ideas for our friends in the U.S. to consider applying.
Rooting for y'all - God bless!
yall never would have been able to do that if the US didnt send billions of dollars to you every year. maybe we should stop wasting our money on isreal and start putting it towards helping ourselves.
@@adrianc6534 You sound bitter. The U.S. has us buy their fighter jets and weapons - not fund desalination etc. And if you think they did not make an excellent investment then think again: Israel's success has been undermining the confidence of the USSR during the cold war - by defeating the USSR's Arab proxies. This deterred the USSR from getting more aggressive. And thanks to Israel the U.S. did not have to face a nuclear Saddam during the Gulf War when he went for most of the world's oil supply. Today Israel's success undermines the confidence of Islamists who wish to destroy the U.S. and the West - because as long as they cannot destroy little Israel, how can they think they could beat the world? War starts and ends in people's MINDS. Plus the U.S. has been making countless billions from Israel's-tech start-up companies. So instead of lashing out at one of your greatest allies - think what you could do to help yourselves. Money won't help you with solving your droughts. Desalination will. I was not bragging - I care about the U/S/ and was sincerely offering advice to whoever might be able to apply it. Call your congressmen. You're welcome.
It works both ways too the USSR jews who came to Israel were highly educated and helped the country economy
More ppl more money higher economy
@@popeofchina8551 I agree with you. The thing is what was done in Israel can be done in the U.S. or anywhere where there is water shortage, to great benefit. Desalination and drip watering systems for agriculture could work anywhere. Literal deserts could be turned highly fertile. The dripping system works well in Africa already.
And how do they cope with the brine afterwards?
Deserts receive less than 12" of rain per year. The deserts of the southwest are millions of years old. The problem is people living / farming the deserts with imported water.
And the way our cities our built with a completely car based infrastructure and large single family homes with lawns isn’t helping either
all based on cheap fossil fuels (cars, energy, fertilizer, pesticides for crops, supply distribution)
Why do the city and federal buildings and businesses have to hav green lawns ??????????????????????
I was gonna say that
Good story about a very sad & bad situation for our nation!!!! Thank you very much!!!!!
When I lived in Phoenix, a developer wanted to build Anthem, north of the city. MILES north. The powers that be looked at all the facts and figures and said "NO WAY. UH UH. NOT GONNA HAPPEN. You don't have the water to seed such a huge development in the desert." So, of course they went to court and said "WE HAVE A PIECE OF PAPER HERE THAT GUARANTEES US WATER RIGHTS FOR 100 YEARS". So they had to let them build it.
Y'all know what you can do with that piece of paper, right?
I was taught that a good agri business would leave one third of your land fallow every year. 1st year for grass crop, second for root crop and third year for grazing and rejuvination.
Seems like they also grow very water dependent crops too.
And permaculture methods to regenerate the soil and land
California's top crops are (in order) dairy products, almonds, grapes, cattle, and strawberries. All require a great deal of water. Agriculture is the real culprit of their water shortage; it uses 80% of their fresh water supplies.
Coachella Valley grape growers use drip irrigation. The vines go dormant during the hottest months of the year.
Restrictions on home owners,
Not farmers, we need food!
And apartment tenants. As of now the landlord is responsible for water consumption (waste) and payments. Too many people in those dwellings waste water since they don't pay for it.
Time for the state to require water meters on individual apartments.
Farmers farming in deserts is the problem. It's the dustbowl from the early 1900s again
@@21stAmendment Time to change culture of what we eat and drink: less meat ( cattle eats alfalfa and alfalfa to grow needs lots of water ), less alcoholic beverage, cola drinks, coffee and caffeine related those needs lots of water.
How about restrictions on country clubs in the middle of deserts using real grass, make them use fake turf
4 gallon's of water for 1almond to be shipped to China there is your water shortage.
It is my understanding that farmers are using 80% of California’s water. That is a lot.
I think its closer to 70 to 75% but yeah most of it
@Joe Chance Oh great insult, Joe. Did it take all day for you to think that one up? - Actually, I could do without almonds. Thx
just amazing the level of damage to many from greed and selfishness, sad...
I think every state is different. The basic 411 on California: 80% of the fresh water in the state is sold dirt cheap to farmers who in the past flooded fields and orchards instead of drip irrigation. My Mom in Silicon Valley regularly paid SJWater, a private for profit water reseller, $200-500/2 month water bill instead of a Public Non profit water provider. Well water is common, even in Silicon Valley, where early computer companies stored dangerous solvents secretly out of sight underground, many tanks leaked, creating many Superfund pollution sites. Both Governor Brown2 and Newsom have signed many secret Fracking permits polluting more groundwater areas. Until very recently there was no state law limiting or regulating how much groundwater people took from the commons, so people drilled deeper and deeper wells, and both Napa Valley and the original marsh of the Central Valley ground level have fallen! There is little recharging of the state aquifers and historic groundwater storage areas. Wildfires and lack of residential water silos of +1000ga just make this worse. Some dams are old and need major repair like Anderson Reservoir above Silicon Valley and San Jose! Only 20% of California fresh water is sold at retail prices to cities and 38+/- millions of residents! SF gets it's water piped from YNP! For "Sunday Morning" to do such a superficial story, a melon grower, is astounding! We subsidize water thirsty crops we don't need and really can't afford such as cotton(most toxic), alfalfa can grow elsewhere with surplus water, and rice for miles but shipped to Asia! I was born in Cal and love it here but see still rapacious over exploitation of everything from limiting rent control and eviction control to boost rents, coastal redwoods 96% clearcut, the foothills gold mines left ravaged or toxic, the sardines of Cannery Row overfish to near extinction slowly coming back, the water waste and state subsidies we all pay for, and now the threat of Fracking poisoning long term our ground water storage areas, and also the threat of the loss of the King and Silver salmon fisheries on the Sacramento River due to commercial over fishing like abalone, water diversion to the vote majority in SoCal, and now "20 years of drought" in spite of a Democratic Party super majority controlling the Legislature both houses and Governor's office for many years! Political stagnation, in a Crisis. That is the Primer on Water in California.
If you'd hold your ground under pressure and character assassination, I'd vote for you. Run for local office.
,,,thanks but all the Corporate Dems have taken $ from the likes of rich minority rental owners, Hill Mullins and BG woman mayors telling me in public ( citizens united court ruling), "the rental owners paid for my campaign, the electorate only voted for me, so of course my first loyalty goes to the rental owners(tiny corrupt bribing minority)".. if you don't think we now need to get such bribes "campaign contributions" out of politics before every Ca politican owns property in Napa and most self enriches, then Democracy is already lost, Biden is just faking a Charade of talk and no action, much too old, spending more on military waste than social programs, not a leader but a follower of "lesser of 2 evils" 2 party choice. Progressives are shunned by Corporate Dems and Green candidates are mostly unfit but for Dr.Jill. I worked long hours for McGovern, etc. Cortese lied to beat Ann Ravel. Politicians won't clean up their nasty nests, thus Willie Brown back room dealer without enough sunshine. Brown and Newsom are unworthy. Get real Voters!!
This is heartbreaking to me as a lover of nature 💔
as a lover of nature this should make you happy.
mother nature knows what shes doing.
sweeping away the ticks n fleas.
Everyone needs to give up their lawns and plant native trees. There is a lot of beauty in the desert.
I've been wondering if we need to focus more on breeding for plants that are water efficient and drought tolerant, like the Navaho corn. Maybe the same could be done for melons at least for transpiration, and with mulches evaporation. Root efficiency too could be improved, and mycorrhizae might help aid the plants in getting water from.below, as well as protecting them in a drought.
I was thinking the same thing. And just crops, but other plants too. A covered land is a cooler land, plants generate soil and when the scale is large enough, even change weather patterns.
I grew up in central Florida where our eco system depends on the large yearly rainfall we get in the summer thunderstorm/tropical storm/hurricane season. The first time I went out west was when I flew into LAX as a young Marine in the early 70's. As we were flying in I looked out the window and for some reason was surprised how brown everything was and the thought crossed my mind that "this is a F'n desert, no way this can be sustainable"...looks like I might have been right..
@@peacenow4456 That's one of the stupidest things I have ever heard in my life.
Drought is the worst of natural disasters as there is no immediate pile of rubble like in a flood or tornado, just a slow sapping of eventually life itself. No CNN news crew to fly in and show the devastation as it looked just the same a week ago. My heart goes out to farmers suffering through this. I have seen it happen in Southern Africa.
This extreme weather is becoming more frequent and more widespread.
no, its not... there are just more people who can see weather happens, every thing is normal... only Dems cant see the truth...every thing is normal, if you repeat it more often, you will believe it... and dont forget to vote GOP...because they will repeat it for you as much you need it to hear, every thing is normal...
@@ArltratloI disagree with your statement
@@happyfunnyfoo what did people do during the last mega drought to conserve water?
@@Arltratlo I bet you’re one of the people who likes to take 2, 30 minute showers a day!
@@Arltratlo Wrong....floods in Europe and Asia are unprecedented....
Rains every day or two where I live, farmers can't their hay off the fields, humid and thunderstorms last 4 weeks nonstop.
Where do you live?
Are you bragging?
Make a big funnel and gather water to ship out to that melon grower in California!🍉🌞
I'm in Massachusetts and it's been raining for 3 weeks
Changes in climate are happening everywhere.
I lived in South Africa as a child and had never seen snow. I was chatting to my cousin in Zimbawe this morning. She sent me pictures from SA of the ground covered in snow. She said it is snowing there more and more.
it used to snow where I am from in Southern Oregon... Till they wiped out all the ancient trees/old growth forests! They made this drought! they have killed the rivers! Go look on Google earth maps sattelite. The deepest green is the old growth! They can't hide it anymore! They logged the west coast 3 tiimes over! They made this problem!
When you have to start eating off paper plates in restaurants then you will get the point. Nothing motivates like a crises.
“And cities that grew out of deserts.”
Me (who lives in a rainforest): “That couldn’t possibly have ended poorly.”
Hmmm ... "desertification"
@@theGoogol Sure. Maybe. Anything is possible. With the amount of rainfall we get here, if Appalachia becomes a desert, I have a funny feeling humanity will have been extinct for some time.
If anything, we’d be more apt to succumb to the pollution of our water sources by industrial pollution by companies like Duke and the coal companies who pillage the place, than falling prey to aquifer depletion.
@@WorldsOkayestSorcerer :. I wouldn't bet on either to be first. I'd bet both within 100 years, if we would be able to live that long.
😇 What It Really Means 😇
Most of the food eaten in the US is grown in California, that's a big problem to national security. We need a much more diversified farming in the US. The Mississippi Ohio and Missouri have excellent farmland, and they will never ever run out of water. They're not positioned along the coast where an enemy or foreign invader could destroy easily our food supply.
The Colorado River is one of the smallest Rivers there is in the United States and one in 10 Americans live off of it that's far too much, compare the flow rate to other rivers.
😇Many People Not Enough Water😇
River Discharge Flow Rates:
Mississippi 593,000 ft³/s
Saint Lawrence 356,700 ft³/s
Columbia 264,900 ft³/s
Ohio 262,700 ft³/s
Missouri 86,340 ft³/s
*
*
*
Colorado 22,600 ft³/s
They say one in 10 Americans live from the water of the Colorado River. Yet it's one of the smallest rivers in America? Everybody needs to realize that you can't sustain populations in the desert in Los Angeles and all these places from that little tiny River. The northwest has plenty of water. So does the Northeast, so does the Midwest, so does the Gulf.
The problem is population density in a bad place. It's called critical mass, unsustainable
@@theGoogol What will likely happen (because people are too stupid to understand patterns) is that the west’s massive farms will go dry and begin to die out. As that happens, like locusts tend to do, they’ll begin working eastward until they come to little old Appalachia; realizing the place has plenty of water and there’s plenty of cheap, workable soil. The robber barons will change from the coal barons, to the agribusiness barons.
Nut farms, fruits orchards, etc will all start springing up on the mountains and, pretty soon, wells will be going dry here, too.
Greed and gluttony are sins for a reason.
I'm blaming almond milk. Way to much water to grow those dam almonds.
If water is so scarce, then why is my city tearing out medians that were not irrigated and installing an irrigation system in the median? Also, why do I see a local school district irrigating a football field when it is raining? Why do I see geysers spewing from broken sprinkler heads in irrigated landscapes? Leave it to the government. It will waste water.
That farmer almost brought me to tears, and I'm thirsty.
Prayers for rain out west. Very 😥.
If you are at home most of the week, you don’t need to bath morning and evening and bath out of a bucket. Brush your teeth using a cup of water. Use the left over water from a bucket you use to bath or wash dishes to flush toilets.
- and don't run the water full blast while doing dishes.
- shower on, get wet - shower Off, lather up - shower on, rinse.
- wash car once a week (unless you live in the desert).
that sound very unamerican....
@@Arltratlo HoW dArE yOu TaKe mY RiGhtS fOr tHe GrEaTeR GoOd!
Means make more water treatment and ponds to hold water. You use the mesh that traps out mist water.
This isn’t a tipping point. That water is NOT getting replaced.
Turn those empty fields into Solar Power
highly, very highly underrated comment!
Do you have any concept at all to how many rare minerals, natural resources and hydrocarbons are used to manufacture solar panels and all the other “green” technologies?
First biggest problem of the climate crisis - food. Expect WWII style rationing within just a few years.
Not at my house. We grow our own food in the back yard.
Expect World War II taxation of the rich, that's the only thing that can save us now, way too many problems we can't afford otherwise.
@@WorldsOkayestSorcerer I'm coming over!
@@JC-kv1vn Veggies and fruits. If you have a 2 ft X 10 ft strip, you can grow many things.
@@WorldsOkayestSorcerer Not if they ration water too.
So very real.
At what point do we raise alarm bells for a dust bowl?
Try leaving three thirds of the fields unplanted, and see what happens to the water supply!
It's rained everyday for 3 weeks here in South Louisiana. Wish the West could get some of this wetness.
We do too!
If we can pipe oil across the country, why not water.
They would if tptb would stop their geoengineering.
why not just build a desalination-plant so they can transfer a certian amount of water from the Pacific into the part of the states low reservoir(s).
@@xxxxMonkeyGirlxxxx That would be socialism.
Maybe Jim Inhofe can donate a few snowballs.
I worked on an organic farm one Summer in Central California and the farmer was really upset they wanted him to put a water meter on his pump and pay for his water. He said the water was from an underground river that never went dry. I should have stayed on the farm. He offered to let me stay. I was off to college to study agricultural ecology but instead dropped to blow glass and practice martial arts full time.
Has the question been asked about installing piping system to be used to replace ditches to bring water to the fields. Talk bout los of water through evaporation and seepage. Solutions to retain water need to be looked at. It is costly but so is not having enough food.
Very good. The county I live in Oregon (also drought conditions here but not as bad) has taken that step. No more open irrigation canals. Everything in pressurized underground pipes, and it is much more efficient. Way less water lost before it gets to farms.
I used less water, take quick shower, water garden 2 times a week and plant more trees around my house. Please let do together can make a big difference, thanks.
Were you not listening? A drop in a bucket.
The system was set up willingly and knowingly wrongfully. Individual actions wont do anything. Even worse, they make the people responsible of doing something (corporations and politicians) not do anything... dont fall to that trap. Do your best but ALSO demand the best from the system, not just individuals!
There are floods in some states and no water in others, we make pipelines for oil, why not water? All the west coast is dry, always has been as long as I can remember. Could we build a water pipe from east to west coast? Maybe it's suppose to happen this way, natural course of things or could be GW?
Long water pipelines would be incredibly expensive to implement and maintain and the relief provided is less than you might think. Getting rid of wasteful uses of water and also finding ways to reuse water should be the first step .
If it rains is there anyway u can build some type of container for collection
So that u can have some for a emergency
You mean like the Hoover dam?
Thank you for the awareness..
The farmer says he’s mad. Read your history. Civilizations have had to move on because of droughts since, forever.
Right, but we can still feel compassion/empathy for the man.
The difference is we are the once causing the changes to our climate that are creating these problems. And it not like we can abandon half the country.
civilisations ended because of drought
@@rileyknox5034 Let's all move to east Texas! They'll hate that! Lol!
Where should he move that isn't mountains, forests, or already overpopulated? Do you live in a wonderland where farmable land is unlimited?
Common sense would tell you not to locate to a region with less water
Common sense isnt common any more! They got "educated"!
.. and thy deserve everything they get! Ha ha ha ha ha! fu-Q America!~
where should we move?
Drip irrigation is the palliative. Or hydroponics
Such a great video
Too much growth in a dessert
Weird but my part of the state of iowa has been pretty rainy. I wish we could somehow send our rivers to the Colorado and not to the Mississippi. We would fill lake mead in 2 hours.
Flagstaff Az has 100yr supply of water at projected population growth according to city officials...good place to move to in the southwest.
“We have to deal with what we have”. What you have is millions more people and industry than the environment of the southwest can support. Like Ed abbey said, infinite population growth in a finite area is the lifestyle of the cancer cell. Our civilization works the same way.
I'm helping out with the drought. I brush my teeth and shower once a week.
Good job.
This is what you people get for clear cutting over 2 MILLION acres of wet lush fire resistant Redwood forests!
... And every mountain range of ancient wet lush fir forests you could! YOU MADE THE DROUGHT! There is only a few thousand acres of redwoods left... out of 2 million acres! You deserve everything you people get! NO MERCY
I live in Colorado-the only part of the West not in drought. We’ve been dealing with smoky, dreary skies during warmer months for an entire year now. I drove by the devastated area that has been burned to a crisp, which goes on for miles and miles in Northern Colorado. I’m worried the entire state is going to burn down in about 10 years.
I just checked the U.S. Drought Monitor for Colorado (7/20/21) and see that 41% of Colorado is in drought. Eighteen % is in the exceptional drought category which is the most extreme.
why did they show glacier national park when discussing the colorado river?
Number 1 user of water in California, Farming. Cities only use about 10% of the water. Even though cities/populations have been growing, their water usage has been falling. So, let's step away from how cities are using too much water and wasting so much, we have not. Famers need to be more efficient in their use of limited water supply and stop planting crops such as tree nuts which are water intensive crops.... we can live without them and if California stops planting them, someone else would pick up the slack, simple supply and demand.
And some nut from nestles got with a gov’t rep to say water is not necessary for life. All in an effort to charge more for bottled water.
I don't buy bottled water mine comes out of the faucet at least for now
Of your tap is fluoridated don’t do that. Just lookin out for ya
👌
Glad I live in the Big Valley Flatlands next to a river.
In 20 year's you'll have everyone from the west moving next to you and it won't be so nice anymore.
Is that a Bronco II at :24?
I dont understand why california hasnt built desalinization plants by now. Makes no sense to me to depend on a river that has to be shared with other land-locked states when we have a vast ocean available, esp with such an extensive coastline too.
I was thinking the same thing. Create jobs and fresh water to survive the drought?
Al Gore, what say you?
No one wants to pay for it. There is no capitalist profit in providing water and it was said before if it’s built water will cost 3x more..l but that price would also force people to value water and not waste it.
@@xxxxMonkeyGirlxxxx There's also the issue of ecologically responsible disposal of the hypersaline water leftover from desalination. Dumping it back in the ocean kills all the nearby fish & stuff.
@@benishborogove2692 Make salt flats, sea salt is the best, pump the ultra salty water to the desert for it to dry, add some jobs too!
@@lauranardoni5626 I have seen proposals for something like that which is hopeful.
It looks like Nevada, SoCal and Utah are a lost cause with water.
Don't forget Arizona.
In a 100,000 years this will be back to normal.
nah...prolly 3
worst drought in 1000 years but here is southern california were getting record rain we dont get this much rain in the winter
now were getting flash floods in southern california its been 6 years since we had flooding and that was in the spring
the story i was told sead every 2-500 years the desert belt moves a few hundread miles north or south to me it sounds like its a movin north now were getting tropical weather in the desert or it could just be our goverment playing with there harp again
With the new mega Casinos and growth in Vegas, no one seems to be worried.
All climate models showing the southwest U.S. getting even drier in coming years so we need to quickly figure out different ways of doing things. Much of Cal. is going to have to give up farming and those farms that remain will have to drip irrigate and if you live in the southwest, like I do, start looking for land back east to move to.
@morgielivie Fortunately, you don't know what you're talking about as MANY people would buy my house Things are getting drying but the apocalypse hasn't happened yet.
No, stay where you are. There are too many people do that already and it's getting crowded over here.
@@oceandrop7666 Nope, movin' but will stay in the west, probably around Seattle but still looking.
Because land is unlimited in the East? The east is overpopulated and there isn't land there like out west.
@@Automedon2 Yeah but, there's very, very little water in the west so there's plenty of desert if one can live without any water, they're welcome to try. And the north east states have a rapidly shrinking population with baby boomers dying off and most of the western states still have increasing population growth.
Tulare county and kings county used to have the biggest lake till the state drained it
Floods everywhere, droughts everywhere else...yikes
Everything has its limits , human population has doubled since 1970 .
Meanwhile all my neighbors have 4+ children and the wifey is pregnant with the 5th.
Population is not the problem. People like to be together, there are abandoned towns, good land unused.
Population is not the problem, even Japan is not over populated, they all want to live in the cities. The countryside has huge abandon family homes in little towns .
Yes, why do golf courses keep getting built in arid lands? Why farm there?
Golf courses use reclaimed water.
@@JohnStray569 it is still water none the less.
Its estimated that in L A alone the swimming pools combined lose 2,000 acre feet of water per year to evaporation. An acre foot is 326,000 gallons. Just multiply those numbers to see the tremendous wastage of fresh water.
That field should have cover crop blends on it if you knew how to actually farm you would know that by having plants in your soil conserves water and allows it to build up while build micro organism in the soil
Everybody in this video talking looks hydrated ash 💀😂
Don't worry, CA is spending billions on high-speed rail that will never be finished, that should making everything all good.
I like the science on the growth rings on the trees that’s some science that doesn’t lie
Shocking.