Drought Buster??

Here in CA We have been having a great start to the winter. The lakes are filling and the amount of Snow in the Serria is looking good. I have been keeping a Eye on (my horse in the race) "New Malonies" it's not doing great but fingers crossed it will creep up. I'm looking forward to doing some road trips this year but only if our lake of choice is nice and full. Right now it looks like Shasta and Trinity are on track to fill up.

Here is where you can see california lake levels. The map up dates every day so you can see the lake level every day.

http://cdec.water.ca.gov/cgi-progs/products/rescond.pdf

My friends in NorCal told me Shasta is 30' from the top. Killer snow pack this year too. I'm already planning our house boat trip this summer.

All the lakes above are all UP 1%-2% with in 24 hrs with no rain. That's great the rain run off is really getting after it. With more rain in the forecast things are looking and getting better for Melonies. Shasta, Orville Don Pedro, Berryessa are almost certain to be 100% full this year. Im wondering how much of the snow in the mountains will fill the lakes. Tahoe is going to be doing well this year as well.

How is Hogan and Camanche? Those were my local lakes growing up.

I live down the street from Oroville. It's less than 50 ft. to the top and coming up quick. Oroville and Shasta filled up last year to the top, and will this year as well. Trinity didn't fill up last year, maybe this year?

The eastern side of the Sierras is doing awesome. Most of our lakes are up 6-7' right now. The snowpack absorbed most of the rain from that massive rain storm. Tahoe has come up 1'. That's a lot of water and there's 10'+ of snow in the mountains. It was great to hear avalanche control blasting away all day Saturday.

Comanche is @ 79%, and New Hogan is @ 57%

We got so much rain, the spillway could not keep up. Dock is 18" above spillway.

^^^ where is this at ^^^

On your way to Sacramento both side of the freeway looked like this

Been busy Grant. Bought a fixer upper on Lake Wildwood. Got a smoking deal. Yeah, I know, its an old fogey lake. No more big wakes. As I am also getting older, I am skiing more. Thus, the Sport Nautique. We shall see how it works out. Either way, it's all good.

Shasta opens spillway. First time in 6 years.

Lake Wildeood Never heard of it please do tell?

I just googled "lake wildwood" Wow what a change for you. How do you like from going from miles of the delta to a very small confined lake. That's not a dig or a put down, "tulloch" our home lake is very small I love it. That being said I have never lived on a large body of water like the delta.

The delta served it's purpose. Fun. Interesting. Short drive. Good for boarding. Not pretty. Not scenic. We would load up the boat and head out for the entire day. It would take 15 minutes to get to fast water and another 15 minutes to get to Victoria. With an least a 1/2 hour each way, you would never go back and forth.

What killed disco for us was the weeds. After a couple of summers where we could not get into the water because of the weeds, we started looking for alternatives. We looked at homes at Lake Tulloch, Lake of the Pines, Lake Combie and Lake Wildwood.

Now we are on a small lake that is beautiful and very lightly used outside of holiday weekends. On any summer weekday, there are maybe 5 boats in a day. We swim and boat and swim and boat. Storage on the boat is no longer a need. Kinda opposite the delta.

The house I bought was/is a serious fixer upper but I got a place on one of the best lots at 1/2 the price of our neighbors houses. So far, we spent some money/energy making the house livable and a bit more money/energy improving the shoreline.

A big side benefit for us is Grass Valley and Nevada City which are quaint old gold mining towns. Lots of good restaurants and interesting history. Night and day from the dirty delta.

We are very happy with this experiment but could have been happy at another lake too. We just did not find the right house at the right time at the other lakes.

Off your topic so excuse me but check out these before/after on the house...

^^^Nice job!

Dane; looks great amazing what some paint and windows and trim can do.
Shasta was at 83% and now it's going down 80% today. That's fine when the lake is close to full with storms on the way, I hope they are holding back when it comes to letting water out of lakes like New Melonies that are not even close to being full. hopefully the drought was a close call for people who regulate the flows and Washington can see how close California came to being in a real jam

Originally Posted by grant_west

Here in CA We have been having a great start to the winter. The lakes are filling and the amount of Snow in the Serria is looking good. I have been keeping a Eye on (my horse in the race) "New Malonies" it's not doing great but fingers crossed it will creep up. I'm looking forward to doing some road trips this year but only if our lake of choice is nice and full. Right now it looks like Shasta and Trinity are on track to fill up.

Here is where you can see california lake levels. The map up dates every day so you can see the lake level every day.

http://cdec.water.ca.gov/cgi-progs/products/rescond.pdf

Since the adults are now in charge I suspect we won't "water" the Delta Smelt in Nor Cal like we did with the 2011 snow pack that would still be in the lakes without that "environmental " intervention

I'm not sure who is in charge of folsom lake. It got to over 70% but they are continuously draining the lake for some unknown reason. Its now down to 44% capacity. I realize they have dumb laws about how high the lake can be right now but they aren't even close to that number.

Saw a report on the news yesterday indicating that California is NOT out of a drought. It's just ridiculous that California can't seem to manage their own water.

Another 3' in the Sierras expected over the next 4 days. Another weekend of pow!

I personally have never paid much attention to water flow's until the Drought word became a common topic around here (6 years +) I.E where the water Go's & who get's what. The California drought, I HOPE opened got peoples attention to make officials accountable for water flows. Failed environmental policy's like "Pulse Flows" have got to go, If you don't know what a pulse flow is, Its a practice they use at our home lake. They Dump water 2 times a year for a few weeks (Spring and Fall), They dump the amount of water the what our entire county uses in 7 years in 2-3 weeks down stream and out to the ocean.

Check this out it explains it, He talks specifically about Folsom, and other lakes
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xQ2U...Om7H374d24Qn4Q

It is right to question ALL environmental legislation. Exhibit A: MTBE. A "green" additive that raised fuel costs, lowered fuel efficiency and poisoned everyone.

All this Rain and the lakes have hardly risen in fact some of them like Shasta and Orville are now lower

Amazing, isn't it? It's hard to fathom that NONE of the water we've received over the past few weeks of storms has stayed in Folsom lake. Why on earth does the lake need to be LOWER than historical averages and LOWER than the regs requires? I understand maintaining some headroom for storm inflows, but this seems ridiculous. It's nice and good that there is a solid snowpack up in the mountains, but at this point I have no confidence that it wil result in anything more than larger sustained outflows and water running down the river and out to the ocean. I sincerely hope I'm wrong. Why, again, were hundreds of millions just spent on adding a second dam at Folsom Lake?

Grant, with all this rain and snow this hopefully helps with keeping Lake Tulloch from becoming a creek again. Have you heard any new information. My father is scared like so many other home owners. What are your thoughts on the topic?

Originally Posted by SoulSurfer

Amazing, isn't it? It's hard to fathom that NONE of the water we've received over the past few weeks of storms has stayed in Folsom lake. Why on earth does the lake need to be LOWER than historical averages and LOWER than the regs requires? I understand maintaining some headroom for storm inflows, but this seems ridiculous. It's nice and good that there is a solid snowpack up in the mountains, but at this point I have no confidence that it wil result in anything more than larger sustained outflows and water running down the river and out to the ocean. I sincerely hope I'm wrong. Why, again, were hundreds of millions just spent on adding a second dam at Folsom Lake?

Two words: flood protection. The real crime here is the lack of storage. There's nowhere to put it. We need to build more dams.

I have a More positive outlook on things #1 Melonies is higher now at this time in the year then it's been in a long time. #2 I'm hearing reports of 30 feet of snow in the Serria's . Our new administration has already made comments about failed water policy's from the last guys and the need to stop or reverse them. So on all fronts we have good news. We also have a new Supervisor in our district Dennis Mills. He was a former water district official and he understands how more then any other official how water should flow. So that's good news.

What was depressing was it seemed like in years past No matter how much water we had it seemed like the Feds were TRYING to create a drought by pushing so much water out to sea With not substantially. I know that can't be true but that's what it seemed like. Like I said the best thing that happens in all of this is it woke up some people.

The Delta needs those fresh water flows for the entire environment and health of the most fertile farming area of all of California ...The Delta. And water flowing to the sea is not a waste.

The primary function of Folsom Lake is flood control. That should help you understand why the let it down. If they hadn't it would have filled and overtopped the dam in one storm.https://www.parks.ca.gov/?page_id=882

I understand and agree Delta needs water comming down the sac river. I believe Shasta and Orville are the deltas water source. I believe the Stanaslaus river is to far south to flow into the delta.

^^ nope. It goes to the delta.

When I google earthed the flow out of Tulloch and into Goodwin and then down the Stan, It looks like it touches the delta on the south end of the delta many forks. Not sure how much of that water would flow up and into discobay, I am Intrested in exactly how and where the rivers flow somif you have any links or info that would be great thanks

This image helps show where the water flows. Almost all of the sierras make their way to the pacific ocean via the delta.
Water flow doesnt care about north/south/east/west. Flow is all about elevation/continental divides.

Originally Posted by grant_west

When I google earthed the flow out of Tulloch and into Goodwin and then down the Stan, It looks like it touches the delta on the south end of the delta many forks. Not sure how much of that water would flow up and into discobay, I am Intrested in exactly how and where the rivers flow somif you have any links or info that would be great thanks

I had a hunch, Googled Stanislaus River and looked on Wiki. I think most of Cali's water north of the grapevine makes it's way to the delta. Good on Mitch for posting the image.

Originally Posted by grant_west

What was depressing was it seemed like in years past No matter how much water we had it seemed like the Feds were TRYING to create a drought by pushing so much water out to sea With not substantially. I know that can't be true but that's what it seemed like. Like I said the best thing that happens in all of this is it woke up some people.

Don't be so sure. The government knows the people will acquiesce power in times of "crisis".

The Delta needs those fresh water flows for the entire environment and health of the most fertile farming area of all of California .

I think most of Cali's water north of the grapevine makes it's way to the delta. Good on Mitch for posting the image.

So let me get this straight The delta gets 99% of all the water that flows out of our beautiful lakes & reservoirs and the Delta still look's like brown Poo? Perhaps Governer Moonbeams tunnels might not be such a bad idea LOL LOL LOL of coarse Im kidding

Originally Posted by grant_west

So let me get this straight The delta gets 99% of all the water that flows out of our beautiful lakes & reservoirs and the Delta still look's like brown Poo? Perhaps Governer Moonbeams tunnels might not be such a bad idea LOL LOL LOL of coarse Im kidding

Ha! That "poo" is just dirt from the ag runoff that gets pumped back into the rivers. Ever notice how the Dirty D gets a lot less poopy after September when irrigation is over for the season? Personally, I don't mind it when it's dirty. It makes you more boyant which is great for surfing. As for Moonbeam, he needs to focus on a new dam. Not some multi-billion dollar high speed rail from Norcal to Socal.

If the farmers runoff is making the Dirty D brown, why not make the farmers filter their discharge? . If simply running a sediment filter on the discharge pump could make the water farmers pump back into the delta cleaner I would be all about that. With that said Farmers are important and they are doing what many call a thankless job. But from what I have seen the current practice of farmers flooding fields as a way of irrigation is so Cave Man style, I wish this practice would or could change.
60 mins did a great story on the CA drought and compared Israils drought to the California drought. Israel made changes and they went from drought statist to haveing a surplus of water. As well as using less pesticides to grow crops from using less water. It was a Win win situation all the way around. I will try and find a link to the story

There are many other tributaries that put dirt in there too. Filtering ag water sediment for cosmetic reasons would be anything but practical on that scale. There is a ton of rice that's grown in the central valley (mostly upriver in the northern end of the central valley). http://www.accrice.com/sustainabilit...ce-production/ They flood the fields and then pump it back out when they're done. Looks like Cali is the #2 rice growing state in the U.S. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rice_p...production.svg

The Delta has been over pumped for years. The intake for the California Aquaduct is in Byron on the south Delta...The main Delta is roughly 60 miles by 60 miles square. Water is pumped into the mammoth canal and sent south to LA and to Westlands water district and the resnicks who own the wonderful co. They water the west side of the south valley ...Kesterson ...Big At uses 70% of that water...They want the tunnels which would totally destroy the Delta largest estuary on the North American continent.

I think how water flows and who gets what is clouded in a fog. It's unclear who gets what and for how much $ Where does the money go? The questions go on and on. I think it's easy to keep us in the dark as to what go's where and so on. It would be nice to get a big picture overview of exactly what is what to better understand where all of our water go's. If anyone has any links to any documentary's on the subject it would be great to see. Thanks

http://www.restorethedelta.org/

If you look up Tulare Lake the huge lake they pumped dry...Mono Lake had all tributaries cut off and only lawsuits saved it from being ruined.

http://www.restorethedelta.org/

#NOTUNNELS

We might be getting a lot more rain next week if this is true. Let's hope they keep Folsom full if we do get it. http://snowbrains.com/noaa-another-a...hoe-next-week/

Originally Posted by grant_west

But from what I have seen the current practice of farmers flooding fields as a way of irrigation is so Cave Man style, I wish this practice would or could change.

I totally agree. I also cant stand seeing them using huge sprinklers to water their crops at 3pm on a 90 degree day. So much of it just evaporates. It makes so much more sense to do it during the morning or night. Unless they need moisture during hot days to not get damaged, but if that is the case then the central valley is not a great place for those crops to be cultivated.

Hey check out this graphic: click on the link and scroll down to the images. You can see before and after photos of Folsom and Shasta as well as San Luis by simply moving your finger across the image.

https://ww2.kqed.org/science/2017/01...ia-reservoirs/

Originally Posted by wakemitch

I totally agree. I also cant stand seeing them using huge sprinklers to water their crops at 3pm on a 90 degree day. So much of it just evaporates. It makes so much more sense to do it during the morning or night. Unless they need moisture during hot days to not get damaged, but if that is the case then the central valley is not a great place for those crops to be cultivated.

I thought you were a teacher, not a farmer. Can we get real here? Does anyone really believe that farmers irrigate in ways that aren't the most efficient? Why would they ever choose to irrigate in a way that is wasteful when they have to pay for everything they use??? There is a time tested science to how, what and why they do what they do. Before anyone criticizes a whole industry, they should educate themselves on the ins and outs. Not just lob ignorant bombs of criticism.

Let's take just one crop for example. Corn. Corn requires you to rip, disk, create furrows and plant each year. How do you drip irrigate that each year and stay in business? Ripping doesn't have to happen every year, but how else can you irrigate that without flood irrigation? Who is gonna put drip irrigation on 1000's of acres of corn each year? It ain't practical at all. Let's just say it became federal law to drip irrigate corn. Do you want to pay $5 an ear for corn?

As for the sprinklers at 3pm on a 90 degree day, did it ever occur to you that the crop might be damaged without that mid-afternoon watering and the farmer is just protecting the crop? Sometimes, farmers need to make adjustments to watering especially near harvest. Just ask the grape growers in Napa.


Let's put our thinking caps on and try to avoid Monday morning quarterbacking here. Especially at the risk of sounding like ignorant fools.

If you want to pick on a particular crop, let's take it case by case. Not sayin that every farmer is perfect. I just think your criticism is based more on knee jerk opinion than true understanding. Feel free to flame me. No offense will be taken.

Originally Posted by grant_west

Hey check out this graphic: click on the link and scroll down to the images. You can see before and after photos of Folsom and Shasta as well as San Luis by simply moving your finger across the image.

https://ww2.kqed.org/science/2017/01...ia-reservoirs/

That's a really cool link.

Originally Posted by markj

I thought you were a teacher, not a farmer. Can we get real here? Does anyone really believe that farmers irrigate in ways that aren't the most efficient? Why would they ever choose to irrigate in a way that is wasteful when they have to pay for everything they use??? There is a time tested science to how, what and why they do what they do. Before anyone criticizes a whole industry, they should educate themselves on the ins and outs. Not just lob ignorant bombs of criticism.

Let's take just one crop for example. Corn. Corn requires you to rip, disk, create furrows and plant each year. How do you drip irrigate that each year and stay in business? Ripping doesn't have to happen every year, but how else can you irrigate that without flood irrigation? Who is gonna put drip irrigation on 1000's of acres of corn each year? It ain't practical at all. Let's just say it became federal law to drip irrigate corn. Do you want to pay $5 an ear for corn?

As for the sprinklers at 3pm on a 90 degree day, did it ever occur to you that the crop might be damaged without that mid-afternoon watering and the farmer is just protecting the crop? Sometimes, farmers need to make adjustments to watering especially near harvest. Just ask the grape growers in Napa.


Let's put our thinking caps on and try to avoid Monday morning quarterbacking here. Especially at the risk of sounding like ignorant fools.

If you want to pick on a particular crop, let's take it case by case. Not sayin that every farmer is perfect. I just think your criticism is based more on knee jerk opinion than true understanding. Feel free to flame me. No offense will be taken.

I actually stated that I wasnt sure if there was a reason for that to prevent dame to the crops. I drive past fields everyday and I have been really curious. I never took the time to look it up, which I should have. But now I know
I was curious because there had been regulations that homeowners could only water their lawn at certain times to prevent evaporation.

Originally Posted by wakemitch

I actually stated that I wasnt sure if there was a reason for that to prevent dame to the crops. I drive past fields everyday and I have been really curious. I never took the time to look it up, which I should have. But now I know
I was curious because there had been regulations that homeowners could only water their lawn at certain times to prevent evaporation.

Yeah that whole lawn watering restriction thing was ridiculous. Lawn watering or residential usage is such a small percentage (15%) of what this state uses relative to industrial usages. Meanwhile, we end up with blight when they kill everyone's lawn. The regs for tract houses in my town didn't even allow enough watering to keep their lawns alive at all. Some people just resorted to painting their dirt green or disobeyed the rules. So glad I have a well.

If you watch the water levels you will see that they are already letting lots of water out of some of the lakes. Don Pedro and Shasta have gone down some over the last week. Hopefully they are doing that knowing they need the room for the snow run off.

Yep they are letting them down ...Sierra has nearly 200% of normal snowpack for this time of year...Still 2 months to go. Just had another 2 decent storms and rain coming next 6 days straight. California has always lurched quickly from flood to drought and back to flood. That is just how it is here. Simply can't store all the water that falls there is too much even for the largest of dams. A full dam facing a big storm is a fool's game.

Looks like Oroville Spillway might have some issues.
http://www.kcra.com/article/water-re...le-dam/8687944

And more rain and more coming in hard Wednesday... There's gonna be trouble.

I'm at the confluence of the Cosumnes and the Mokelumne and the Cosumnes is the only river on the entire Sierra Nevada that has no dam or dams. These babies are both going to flood stage and pretty much all NorCal is sopping wet and green like spring.

Pretty much screwed...They are going to try the never tested dirt emergency spillway...This is going to be much worse before it gets better
https://ww2.kqed.org/news/2017/02/07...-oroville-dam/

Some stats ... Oroville is the highest dam in the US. It has a 4000 square mile watershed.

During last 24 hours Folsom Lake received 25% of it's total capacity.

Not good looks like the Oroville Spillway is getting worse.

https://mobile.twitter.com/tvseanb/s...257088/video/1

^^^^ wow^^^^ that spillway sink hole opens up much larger.
Things are happing here in CA. New Melonies was at 35% at the start of this thread, today is at 49% that's a great jump.

We drove over to NewMelonies yesterday to have a peek. It's still SUPER LOW. Even at 50% there is a Amazing amount of water that would need to come into full the lake. I was trying to imagin the amount of water as I looked out over what I could see of the lake and the weight That water represents. I would Love for New Melonies to be full but I just can't wrap my brain around that much water comming in. My fingers are crossed and I hope she fills,

A Old timer at our lake said that after they Built New Melonies the experts said it would take 20 years to fill. He said the year it was compleated they had record rain and it fill the lake in 1 year. Amazing anything is possible

Estimates are 13 hours til Oroville dam is overtopping

Originally Posted by grant_west

A Old timer at our lake said that after they Built New Melonies the experts said it would take 20 years to fill. He said the year it was compleated they had record rain and it fill the lake in 1 year. Amazing anything is possible

I looked at average snow run off for Melones and it is a little over 1 million acre feet. With all the snow it should be greater than that this year. I could see it getting close to full. Also if you look at the daily numbers, it gains more cubic acre feet in one day than Tulloch holds. Truly amazing!

^^^Wow. That's imppressive.

Evacuation underway for total failure at Oroville Dam right now......A dam buster this winter will go down in history

Just imagine if California had spent all that money that went on the bullet train to nowhere on water reclamation.

More proof that the so called experts are in fact idiots

Highest dam in the US higher than Hoover...770 feet...Out of control with storms coming

They just admitted they are at the mercy of mother nature

16,000 surface acres

Typical Libral "sky is falling"

200,000 evacuated

we can give your boat the special bridge treatment Grant come on down to the Delta.

Fakes news hey Grant

*^^* That's Funny, my comment was supposed to be a joke. I should have done a better job showing that.

are these not inspected at least every few years? I get it that water hasn't gone over emergency spillway since it was built, but sounds like the dam issues have been around for a while.

Yeah I was teasing , could resist

Melonies up to 55% wow that's pretty good just hope it stops raining up north and the next storm go's more south. I'm still pretty blown away. If the Red line on the chart indicates Normal Lake level for this time of year does that mean the lake fills the rest of the way up from snow run off? Example each year are they saying the lake is to go down to the red line come winter time and then fill each spring /Summer. The reason I ask Melonies at 55% looks close to normal. Winter level if I'm reading the chart correctly. That means each year the lake go's down to 50% and re-fills in a normal winter?