Maybe no other issue has dominated the discussion of
resources in the American West this
Spring than water - the lack of it and the consequential impact on agriculture,
business and individual homeowners.
California, the nation’s largest state and by some
estimates home to the world’s seventh ranking economy, is facing another season
in a multiyear drought that has resulted in fallowed crop land and the prospect of rising food prices in and outside
its borders.
Much of California’s massive agricultural economy,
consuming an estimated 80% of the state’s water, was created with the largesse
of water captured from the Colorado River and other sources far from where
crops are grown.
For
the past two years junior water rights holders in the vast Central Valley,
where almonds, tomatoes, melons and apricots are among crops, have been unable
to irrigate as water has been allocated by a federal agency to senior rights holders in southern
California.
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| Watering California's growth |
Apart from agriculture, urban areas such as Los Angeles
could only exist with water originating from far away sources such as aqueducts connected to interior sources in the state and the Colorado River, which also
enables Las Vegas, Phoenix, Tucson and other desert cities to exist.
The California situation has prompted Gov. Jerry Brown to
declare a statewide emergency and impose a mandatory goal to reduce water use
by 25%, excluding agricultural consumption. Brown dramatized the declaration by standing on a grassy area of the
Sierras that is usually buried under several feet of snow this time of year.
Costly desalinization projects are underway in San Diego County
and elsewhere in the state to squeeze potable water from the vast Pacific
coastline. Farmers and ranchers are turning to groundwater sources by digging new wells, which are not regulated by the state--unlike Oregon, Washington and other states.
The snowpack in many other areas west of the continental
divide is at historic lows including single digit percentages of normal in some
places, with a few exceptions.
Only
near normal or above rainfall has helped fill many reservoirs as the irrigation
season begins and residential lawns revive with the spray of sprinklers that
have been idle over the winter.
In
Oregon the southern part of the state is again facing the toughest water
challenges. Klamath Basin irrigators will once more face curtailed water
diversions tied to a low snow year combined with continued reductions related
to allocation of water to the Klamath Tribes for fish habitat.
Bend and Central Oregon, with the exception of the upper
Crooked River and the Sisters are to part of Lower Bridge in Terrebonne relying on Wychus Creek drainage, are in better shape than southern Oregon. The Three Sisters Irrigation District which relies on Wychus Creek (formerly Squaw Creek, has no reservoir storage to augment water from snowmelt and springs, unlike the other Deschutes basin districts .
Gov.
Kate Brown has declared a drought emergency for Crook County, where irrigators
rely primarily on the Crooked River drainage. Prineville Reservoir on Crooked River is only at 84% of normal as of
April 6 and the low snowpack in the Ochoco Mountains portends there will be
marginal recharge from Spring and Summer runoff.
On
April 6 of this year the stream gauge of the Bureau of Reclamation above Prineville
Reservoir recorded Crooked River flows at 216 cubic feet per second (cfs), below
half of the 439 cfs logged on the same date in 2014 and less than 25% of the
historic average.
The
snowwater equivalent measured by the Natural Resources Conservation Service at
14 stations in the Deschutes/Crooked river watersheds ranged from a low of less
than 1% of median to slightly more than 38% at Irish-Taylor Lakes west of Waldo
Lake and Summit Lake nearer to Crane Prairie Reservoir.
Wickiup
and Crane Prairie reservoirs which hold water from the upper Deschutes River
were at 100% of normal as irrigation districts with water rights in that basin
opened canal headgates for the season.
The
low snowpack in the Deschutes watershed
has been offset, as elsewhere, by above normal rainfall this winter. But, as in
the Crooked River basin and Prineville reservoir, Wickiup and Crane Prairie
will not benefit as usual from replenishment of a steady snowmelt.
Understanding Central Oregon Water Use
Central Oregon agriculture, unlike much of California, benefits from water drawn from within its river basins--with an interdependent system of wells, reservoirs
and irrigation canals that from April through October enable crop production in
an otherwise arid environment.
Originating
in the Cascade mountains, water from springs and snowmelt makes its way into
the upper Deschutes Basin reservoirs such as Crane Prairie and Wickiup, both
of which were created through efforts of the region’s major irrigation
districts.
These
and other irrigation districts in Oregon serve as trustees for water rights for
specific agricultural lands, some of those rights dating back to the late
1800s.
Some
landowners have senior rights to divert water directly from the Deschutes or
other streams, including the City of Bend which takes water through pipelines
for residential domestic use from the Tumalo-Bridge Creek watershed that joins
the Deschutes.to the north of town.
In
efforts to mitigate losses of water from leaking canals several districts
including Wychus and the Central Oregon Irrigation District have started piping
sections of their systems. Although the projects reduce transmission losses
from the canals, some opponents argue that piping also lowers natural recharge of
aquifers and results in loss of nearby trees and vegetation.
The
major irrigation districts in the region are COID which serves farms and
ranches south and east of Bend into the Powell Butte area, and the North Unit
providing water to the region’s large agricultural operations from Redmond to the
Culver and Madras areas.
The
Tumalo, Swalley and Arnold districts provide water in the Tumalo area west of
Bend and the Three Sisters Irrigation District delivers waters of Wychus Creek from the Cascades
through the town of Sisters and down to the Lower Bridge area of Terrebonne.
The
Ochoco Irrigation District distributes water from the Crooked River below
Bowman Dam which captures runoff from the Ochocos, the area most imperiled low
snowpack.
One
byproduct of the continued California drought is an increase in visits by ranchers
and farmers considering relocating cattle and crop operations to Central Oregon
where water problems are much less severe.
