California has pioneered some of the
toughest state environmental legislation to address environmental
issues. For example, laws focused attention on “instream uses” of
water to benefit fish and wildlife, recreation, water quality and
aesthetics. Among water-related issues, in general, are
climate change, toxic waste disposal, pollution and loss of
wildlife and habitat.
Also, the California Legislature was the first in the country to
protect rare plants and animals through passage of the California
Endangered Species Act in 1970.
San Francisco Baykeeper, California Sportfishing Protection
Alliance, Restore the Delta, and Friends of the River today
filed a lawsuit against the US Fish and Wildlife Service and
the Secretary of the US Department of the Interior for failing
to deliver a legally required initial determination whether or
not to list the San Francisco Bay’s population of White
Sturgeon as a threatened species. … White Sturgeon
are North America’s largest freshwater fish. … (T)he state
plans to build new diversions—including Sites Reservoir and the
Delta Tunnel—which represent an imminent threat to the White
Sturgeon, as well as other native fish, including Central
Valley Chinook Salmon that support the state’s coastal salmon
fishery.
Just over 270 Southern California steelhead trout were rescued
last week from their last refuge in the Santa Monica Mountains.
The rescue came about a week after hundreds of another type of
endangered fish were liberated from the same watershed. The
watershed, a biodiversity hot spot located in Malibu, was badly
burned and may take a decade to fully recover.
The California Department of Fish and Wildlife (CDFW) [Jan.
21] announced the selection of 15 projects that will
receive funding for the restoration, enhancement and protection
of salmon and steelhead (anadromous salmonid) habitat in
California watersheds. The total funding for these projects
amounts to more than $15 million in grant awards. Among these
15 projects, the Salmon River Restoration Council was awarded
$1,888,060 for the Windler Floodplain Habitat Enhancement
Project. The project will enhance salmonid rearing habitat at
the Windler River bar, on a reach of the North Fork Salmon
River, by lowering the floodplain and increasing connectivity.
The project also includes riparian revegetation, which will
increase shade and diversity along channels and across the
river bar.
Eschmeyer’s Catalog of Fishes is the definitive global source,
with the Latin name for 65,000 species compiled by biologists
at the California Academy of Sciences under the leadership of
Bill Eschmeyer of San Anselmo, who spent 40 years on an
odyssey that took him to every museum with a collection of dead
fish in jars. The database he created, which started before the
Internet, was still growing and being refined long after
Eschmeyer retired and moved to the East Coast to be near his
three adult children. He died Dec. 30 at an assisted care
facility in Nashua, N.H., said his daughter Lanea Tripp, who
was named for an 18th century Swedish biologist her father
admired. Eschmeyer had suffered from dementia compounded by
long COVID. He was 85.
Americans deserve a clean environment “without suffocating the
economy,” Lee Zeldin said during his Senate confirmation
hearing Thursday to lead the Environmental Protection Agency, a
department likely to play a central role in President-elect
Donald Trump’s pledge to slash federal regulations and promote
oil and gas development. “The American people elected President
Trump last November in part due to serious concerns about
upward economic mobility,” Zeldin said. “A big part of this
will require building private sector collaboration to promote
commonsense, smart regulation.” The hearing occasionally grew
pointed when Democrats questioned Zeldin about climate change
asking what, if anything, he thinks should be done about a
problem that has worsened floods and raised sea levels but that
Trump has dismissed.
The Yurok Fisheries Department has completed a major milestone
in the restoration of the Klamath River ecosystem. Following
the removal of dams along a 38-mile stretch of the river, the
department’s Revegetation crew recently hand-sowed 11,500
pounds of native plant seeds between the former Iron Gate Dam
and JC Boyle Reservoir. The seeds included a diverse mix of
native grasses, herbs, and forbs that historically thrived in
the area. As part of this ambitious restoration project, the
crew will plant 21,000 white oak acorns and 108,000 native
trees and shrubs in the coming months. Since the project began,
the team has planted approximately 76,000 trees, shrubs, and
grass plugs, 28,000 acorns, and 4,200 milkweed starts.
Wildflowers, pine saplings, and baby oaks are already thriving
in the post-dam environment.
An extensive fight to protect the water of Nevada’s Amargosa
Valley may soon be won, ending a nearly two-year battle that
spanned from the nation’s capital to the porches of Nye County
residents forced to spend thousands of dollars to drill their
wells deeper. If approved, any new attempts of exploration for
lithium or any other minerals near the Ash Meadows National
Wildlife Refuge, about 90 miles northwest of Las Vegas, will be
denied for 20 years. The Bureau of Land Management recommended
that Deb Haaland, secretary of the Interior, use her power on
Tuesday to initiate a so-called 20-year “mineral withdrawal,”
an action that suspends new mining activity in a swath of land
that spans nearly 309,000 acres. The initiation of the
withdrawal process immediately suspends new mining development
activities in the proposed area for a period of two years,
during which land managers can conduct an environmental
review.
Four populations of California’s foothill yellow-legged frog
would be protected with the help of 760,071 acres of designated
critical habitat, under a Fish and Wildlife Service proposal
made public Monday. The proposed critical habitat includes
forested portions of the wildfire-prone Sierra Nevada as well
as the Santa Cruz mountains and coastal areas. Together, the
proposed critical habitat is designed to support the endangered
South Sierra and South Coast populations and the threatened
North Feather and Central Coast populations of the
yellow-legged frog. All told, the proposed critical
habitat is identified in 27 frog-occupied parcels, with 47
percent of the affected land owned by the federal government,
while 49 percent of the total acreage is privately owned.
Critical habitat is not a reserve, but activities involving
federal funding or other action on the land require
consultation with the Fish and Wildlife Service.
Katharine MacGregor, who was named this weekend as
President-elect Donald Trump’s choice for deputy secretary of
the Interior Department, appears well-positioned to lead the
incoming administration’s push for “energy dominance” on public
lands along with expanded access for hunting and fishing at
wildlife refuges and other public lands. And in what would be
her second stint in Interior leadership, she would be
well-poised to move efficiently, according to her colleagues
from the first Trump administration. “I don’t want to be too
flippant about it, but they’re not … around,” said Joe
Balash, who was Interior’s assistant secretary of lands and
minerals management in the first Trump administration. “Kate’s
been there. She knows how it works. She’s there to make things
happen. … This is no time for on-the-job training.”
… Sandhill cranes return to the same spots every year, so
seeing some birds roosting with the decoys is “very exciting,”
said Greg Golet, an avian ecologist with The Nature Conservancy
who helps run a program to expand wetland habitat for migratory
species called Bird Returns. The Central Valley is one of
the most important regions of the Pacific Flyway for cranes and
other waterbirds to overwinter or rest and refuel on their way
further south. It supports hundreds of resident and migratory
species that come here from breeding grounds as far north as
the Arctic tundra. … Protecting wild birds and the
vanishing native ecosystems they depend on has left ecologists
scrambling to create as much habitat as possible, where and
when migrating birds need it most.
After nearly a century of people building dams on most of the
world’s major rivers, artificial reservoirs now represent an
immense freshwater footprint across the landscape. Yet, these
reservoirs are understudied and overlooked for their fisheries
production and management potential, indicates a study from the
University of California, Davis. The study, published
in the journal Scientific Reports, estimates that U.S.
reservoirs hold 3.5 billion kilograms (7.7 billion pounds) of
fish. Properly managed, these existing reservoir ecosystems
could play major roles in food security and fisheries
conservation.
California has unveiled an ambitious plan to help combat the
worsening climate crisis with one of its invaluable assets: its
land. Over the next 20 years, the state will work to transform
more than half of its 100 million acres into multi-benefit
landscapes that can absorb more carbon than they release,
officials announced Monday. … The plan also calls for
11.9 million acres of forestland to be managed for biodiversity
protection, carbon storage and water supply protection by 2045,
and 2.7 million acres of shrublands and chaparral to be managed
for carbon storage, resilience and habitat connectivity, among
other efforts.
Tiny pieces of plastic waste shed
from food wrappers, grocery bags, clothing, cigarette butts,
tires and paint are invading the environment and every facet of
daily life. Researchers know the plastic particles have even made
it into municipal water supplies, but very little data exists
about the scope of microplastic contamination in drinking
water.
After years of planning, California this year is embarking on a
first-of-its-kind data-gathering mission to illuminate how
prevalent microplastics are in the state’s largest drinking water
sources and help regulators determine whether they are a public
health threat.
Algal blooms are sudden overgrowths
of algae. Their occurrence is increasing in California’s
rivers, creeks and lakes and along the coast, threatening the
lives of people, pets and fisheries.
Only a few types of algae can produce poisons, but even nontoxic
blooms hurt the environment and local economies. When masses
of algae die, the decaying can deplete oxygen in the water to the
point of causing devastating fish kills.
Excess salinity poses a growing
threat to food production, drinking water quality and public
health. Salts increase the cost of urban drinking water and
wastewater treatment, which are paid for by residents and
businesses. Increasing salinity is likely the largest long-term
chronic water quality impairment to surface and groundwater in California’s Central
Valley.
The 28-page Layperson’s Guide to Nevada Water provides an
overview of the history of water development and use in Nevada.
It includes sections on Nevada’s water rights laws, the history
of the Truckee and Carson rivers, water supplies for the Las
Vegas area, groundwater, water quality, environmental issues and
today’s water supply challenges.
Stretching 450 miles long and up to
50 miles wide, the Sierra Nevada makes up more than a quarter of
California’s land area and forms its largest watersheds,
providing more than half of the state’s developed water supply to
residents, agriculture and other businesses.*
The California Environmental Quality
Act, commonly known as CEQA, is foundational to the state’s
environmental protection efforts. The law requires proposed
developments with the potential for “significant” impacts on the
physical environment to undergo an environmental review.
Since its passage in 1970, CEQA (based on the National
Environmental Policy Act) has served as a model for
similar legislation in other states.
This issue of Western Water examines that process. Much
of the information is drawn from discussions that occurred at the
November 2005 Selenium Summit sponsored by the Foundation and the
California Department of Water Resources. At that summit, a
variety of experts presented findings and the latest activities
from areas where selenium is of primary interest.
