Reaching Beyond what Nature Provides
It feels like summer and it is not supposed to. Our rains have been very small and not nearly enough to make the kind of grass to support the livestock herds for an entire year. If one could predict the weather, it would make decisions so much easier but, alas, that doesn’t happen. Remember the year we had the miracle rains of March, with 20 inches? Maybe we’ll be lucky and get something like that this year. If not, we will be facing a very dry year which means less water available for people and agriculture and more likelihood of fires.
For fifty plus years, residents on the South Coast have relied on water delivered from the Santa Ynez Valley from Lake Cachuma. As the availability of water from the Valley diminishes due to growth and fish protection, the folks sitting on a vast ocean might begin to consider finding some other sources. Just as we might want to become less dependent on foreign sources for our energy needs, so too those living on an ocean might look to desalinization as an answer to their water needs. Years from now, as growth expands the Valley’s needs beyond what Mother Nature provides, perhaps that same tunnel which now sends our water through the mountain to the South Coast will deliver to us fresh water from the ocean.
It is time to start looking forward and not always reacting in a crisis fashion. Such, I think would be the main focus of the Integrated Regional Water Management Plan (IRWMP). Granted, the inception of the involved groups was due to Prop 50 which required a regional water management plan, which we didn’t have, so quickly water agencies, “environmental groups” and anybody who could claim some nexus to water banded together to form a “plan” in order to qualify for these funds.
What seems to have happened in their haste to get on board this gravy train was that the general public and agriculture in particular got left at the station. What the plan seems to mostly focus on is to repair “impaired” waters which have somehow been determined to be legion in our area. Nowhere is there any evidence to support these conclusions, nor is there any data provided or scientific strategy to justify the conclusions. In fact, when asked what proof there was that these waters were “impaired”, the people in charge refused to give out any information at all.
In reading the tables included in their document, it appears that in most cases one of the major culprits for the impairment is agriculture. It is listed on the top in almost every location. So what exactly is agriculture putting in our waterways? Don’t know. Can’t tell from the tables or anything else how they determined that it was agriculture contributing nitrates (which occur naturally) or anything else. Could this simply be a make-work way to destroy agriculture in one simple move?
It is well known that the hijacked environmental movement has a primary goal to get agricultural people off their lands and back into the cities. It is amusing to me that these are the same people who want us to all grow corn for their car fuel not realizing that prices for food and many other things are already going up because of the demand for corn which ,ultimately, cannot be fulfilled even if we plant every plantable acre in one crop. Non-agricultural people would not know that to plant an abundance of one crop to the exclusion of a variety is a recipe for disaster. It is an open invitation for some pest or virus or bacteria to move in and destroy the entire crop. This is one of those unwritten principles of agriculture.
The inception of this plan is similar to the one that suddenly appeared a couple of years ago blessed by the government to clear up supposed problems that cultivated agriculture was causing to the local watershed. The end result was that farmers of irrigated fields were required to pay exorbitant fees, attend classes and join watershed groups in order to continue growing their crops. To not participate would incur steep fines if one was qualified to join. Although many local farmers were initially in favor of this program, mistakenly assuming that there was justification for it, there is now a plan to make the same requirements of dry grazing land which will impact all cattlemen. There is still absolutely NO data to suggest that cattle on dry grazing land are negatively impacting any water quality, yet there are those on the State level who feel they know better. Could this be part of the same anti-agriculture agenda we see in so many other arenas?
It is my fervent hope that more people other than “environmentalists” get involved in the IRWMP to help prevent a bias in favor of bashing agriculture. There will be a huge hue and cry that they are trying to support agriculture; unfortunately, they don’t know enough about it and don’t want to listen to learn so that they end up demanding “solutions” that are actually harmful to the environment.
Fire Season
Looks like conditions are being set up, at least so far, for the Valley to have a serious fire season. You may not be aware of this but the State of California’s Legislative Analysts Office (LAO) is looking to impose State Responsibility Area Fees on private landowners. That means that if your property borders any State owned land like a park or forest, you would be subject to these fees in addition to the taxes you already pay to the State. The LAO is asking for $10/acre to pay for wildland firefighting whether the fire is caused by nature, arson, carelessness or you. Their justification for this fee is due to costs going up, changing fire conditions, labor costs and increasing development in wildland areas.
Although I have great respect for our firefighters who keep us safe under the most frightening conditions, I find this proposed fee to be very destructive to agriculture in particular and rural areas in general. A five thousand acre pasture would have a bill of $50,000! This is outrageous and stems from a lack of responsible funding of State projects that are truly needed as opposed to the myriad of “feel-good” projects demanded by so-called environmental causes that waste public dollars to the tune of millions and perhaps billions.
A SOLUTION?
The first thing that needs to be done is to totally revamp the policies of the State and counties fire departments which are reactive instead of proactive. Due to a decade of hard-hitting although misinformed dialogue from the “environmental” community, State and local fire departments have essentially, abandoned the land to take care of itself. This has been the formula of caretaking of most public lands in the US; even though most owners of large tracts of privately held land could tell you that this is worst way to manage land. Scientists are now producing evidence proving that point. Land that has been left alone to develop “naturally” which is how most public land is treated is overtaken by scrub plants which ultimately choke out less tolerant native plants and provide a huge amount of fuel to burn. Leaving debris like dead trees around (Yellowstone is a good example) merely provides more fuel for the fire and, additionally, eliminates habitat for many animals. This enormous amount of fuel produces very hot fires which sterilize the soil, preventing plant reemergence for many years resulting in severe erosion, siltation of rivers and streams and general malaise of the land for a long time. Starting right now, very carefully, controlled burns can restore these lands to their original vigor. Until State and local policies regain some common sense and stop listening to a group of people who don’t know what they are talking about, we will be held hostage to the same horrific conditions leading to wildland fires such as we have been seeing already in Orange County last month.
Given the misdirection I see in many environmental policies today, it makes me wonder why that is. It is obvious to many that the mainstream media has been hijacked from reality as well. I am not only referring to local media but those so-called news information services across the country and overseas as well. There seems to be some rampant aversion to the truth if it does not comply with some pre-disposed agenda. There is a really scary trend that I have been observing for the last few years where if you want to discuss or question some popularly held idea, you are either unable to get your point out through the press or , in extreme cases, you get death threats. There have been reports recently of newscasters losing their jobs or being threatened because they have questioned the validity of the global warming theory being espoused by most mainstream media. This is a direct threat to a very American concept of Freedom of Speech, something protected by law in the First Amendment of the Constitution. Somehow, these days, it seems this right is being applied very selectively which is illegal. In that spirit, I would like to invite you to watch a 75 minute piece about the topic of global warming that will certainly give you something new to think about. I would love to hear your comments about it. The website is: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XttV2C6B8pU This topic is so important that I think we deserve to have a factual discussion about it and not just take some obvious politically agendized “facts” as true. At the very least, I would encourage you to search out the differing positions and decide for yourself. Gone is the day when our press can be relied on for unbiased information. All I can do is present information that you will most likely not find elsewhere so as to get a balance of the issues.
SHORT NOTES
The first case of equine West Nile Virus has been reported in California in Sonoma County. Last year we didn’t have a case until June and by the end of the year 24 horses had died from the virus. Please, horse owners; get your horses vaccinated now.
I just heard about a wonderful new device, a wristband, being produced by a group of people called Project Lifesaver which is designed to use a GPS system to help locate missing persons. This was originally used for Alzheimer patients but could also be very useful for children as well. I Googled Project Lifesaver and found a very interesting website talking about their program and the successes they have had. Check it out.