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For more than 100 years, invasive
species have made the Sacramento-San Joaquin Delta their home,
disrupting the ecosystem and costing millions of dollars annually
in remediation.
The
latest invader is the nutria, a large rodent native to South
America that causes concern because of its propensity to devour
every bit of vegetation in sight and destabilize levees by
burrowing into them. Wildlife officials are trapping the animal
and trying to learn the extent of its infestation.
The Sierra Nevada mountains, which
are key to California’s water supply through snowmelt, are dotted
with nearly 130 million dead trees weakened by drought and insect
infestations.
The severe tree mortality has increased the risk of
devastating wildfires, reduced the ability of forests to absorb
greenhouse gases and limited the effectiveness of forests and
meadows to regulate water quality and moderate downhill flow.
While the 2012-2016 drought was one leading cause of tree
mortality in California, the dry conditions also exacerbated
tree infestations from more than a half-dozen different bark
beetles.
On our Headwaters Tour,
June 28-29, guests
will hear from leading forest managers and entomologists
about the extent of this epidemic, how it is
altering forests and impacting upper watersheds, and what
can be done to mitigate the damages.
“Facing Reality from the Headwaters
to the Delta” will be the theme of this year’s Water Summit, featuring top
policymakers and others sharing the latest information on key
issues affecting water in California and the Southwest.
The day-long event on Sept. 20 is the Water Education
Foundation’s premiere event of the year. It will be held at the
Westin Sacramento. Look for more details and speaker
announcements coming soon!
In the meantime, join Nutrien
Ag Solutions in securing a sponsorship opportunity and
gaining publicity for your organization by sponsoring lunch
or the evening reception along the beautiful Sacramento River.
Learn about all the sponsorship opportunities
here. Contact Kasey Chong
via email or at 916-812-2643 with any questions.
As California embarks on its
unprecedented mission to harness groundwater pumping, the Arizona
desert may provide one guide that local managers can look to as
they seek to arrest years of overdraft.
Groundwater is stressed by a demand that often outpaces natural
and artificial recharge. In California, awareness of
groundwater’s importance resulted in the landmark Sustainable
Groundwater Management Act in 2014 that aims to have the most
severely depleted basins in a state of balance in about 20 years.
Water supply for
California’s cities and farms is largely dependent on
snowmelt from the upper watershed in the Sierra Nevada. But that
paradigm is being challenged by wildfires, climate change and
widespread tree mortality.
Join us for a two-day tour as we head into the Sierra foothills
and up into the mountains to examine water issues that happen
upstream, but have dramatic impacts on water supply and quality
downstream and throughout the state.
The Sacramento-San Joaquin Delta is
the West Coast’s largest estuary and a vital hub in California’s
complex water delivery system. It’s also a rich farming area, an
important wetlands – and an ecologically troubled region.
On our Bay-Delta Tour, May
16-18, participants will hear from a diverse group of
experts, including water managers, environmentalists, farmers,
engineers and scientists who will offer different perspectives on
the proposed tunnels project, efforts to revitalize the Delta,
and risks that threaten its delicate ecological balance. The
controversial tunnels project, which would carry water beneath
the Delta, got a boost recently when Metropolitan Water
District of Southern California
voted to cover nearly $11 billion of the construction
cost.
Join our team at the Water Education
Foundation, an impartial nonprofit in midtown Sacramento that has
been a trusted source of water news and educational programs in
California and across the West for more than 40 years.
We have a full-time opening for an energetic, motivated,
articulate and detail-oriented Programs Manager who serves
as a member of the Foundation’s events team while focusing
on one of its most popular programs – water tours.
Spurred by drought and a major
policy shift, groundwater management has assumed an unprecedented
mantle of importance in California. Local agencies in the
hardest-hit areas of groundwater depletion are drawing plans to
halt overdraft and bring stressed aquifers toward recovery. Along
the way, an army of experts has been enlisted to help
characterize the extent of the problem and how the Sustainable
Groundwater Management Act of 2014 is implemented.
One of those policy experts is Michael Kiparsky, director of the
Wheeler Water Institute within the Center for Law, Energy & the
Environment at the University of California, Berkeley, School of
Law. Kiparsky recently co-authored a report that focuses on a
pilot project in Santa Cruz County’s Pajaro Valley that he
says has intriguing potential for broader applicability.
The Big Day of Giving is today, and
your donation can help the Foundation continue its work to
enhance public understanding about California’s most
important natural resources — water.
The Big Day of
Giving is an annual 24-hour online event aimed at
raising funds for nonprofits in the Sacramento region and
highlighting the good work they do.
The Water Education Foundation has been around in California for
more than 40 years! Have you ever been curious about our Water
Leaders program, our tours or workshops, and Western
Water news?
Join us for a reception at our midtown Sacramento office from
4:30 to 6:30 p.m. May 3 to meet the staff, enjoy refreshments and
check out what we do. Sign up
here for the open house so we have a head count.
One of the most frequently discussed
animals in the Sacramento-San Joaquin Delta is fish. From the
anadromous life cycle of the salmon to the controversial and
little-understood Delta smelt to invasive species such as the
largemouth bass, few animals have a larger impact on water policy
and infrastructure in the Delta than the dozens of native and
introduced fish found there, especially those species considered
endangered.
On our annual Bay-Delta
Tour, May 16-18, you will spend three days immersed in
water-related topics, and among them is fish. Most notable is the
endangered Delta smelt, whose protections have at times halted
the pumps that send water from the Delta to the San Joaquin
Valley and Southern California.
Stop by our midtown Sacramento
office Thursday afternoon, May 3, to learn what we do to educate
and foster public understanding of one of California’s most
precious natural resources — water — and see how you can
support our work.
Join us for an open house and reception at our office from
4:30 to 6:30 p.m. to meet the staff, enjoy refreshments and check
out what we do. We’ll have local wines as well as beer donated by
Sacramento’s Track 7 Brewing Company. Sign up
here for the open house so we have a head count.
Join our team at the Water Education
Foundation, an impartial nonprofit in midtown Sacramento that has
been a trusted source of water news and educational programs in
California and across the West for more than 40 years.
We have a full-time opening for an energetic, motivated,
articulate and detail-oriented Programs Manager who serves
as a member of the Foundation’s events team while focusing
on one of its most popular programs – water tours.
Go deep into California’s water hub
on our Bay-Delta
Tour May 16-18, and see water conveyance, pumps and
storage systems, including components of the State Water Project
and the Central Valley Project.
Among the stops is a reservoir expansion project recently deemed
eligible by the California Water Commission for sought-after
state bond funds.
The Sacramento-San Joaquin Delta is
the West Coast’s largest estuary and a vital hub in California’s
complex water delivery system. It’s also a rich farming area, an
important wetlands – and an ecologically troubled region.
On our Bay-Delta Tour, May
16-18, participants will hear from a diverse group of
experts, including water managers, environmentalists, farmers,
engineers and scientists who will offer different perspectives on
the proposed tunnels project, efforts to revitalize the Delta,
and risks that threaten its delicate ecological balance. The
controversial tunnels project, which would carry water beneath
the Delta, got a boost last week when Metropolitan Water District
of Southern California
voted to cover nearly $11 billion of the construction
cost.
Sixty percent of California’s developed water supply originates
high in the Sierra Nevada.Thus, the state’s water supply is
largely dependent on the health of Sierra forests, which are
suffering from ecosystem degradation, drought, wildfires and
widespread tree mortality.
Join us as we head into the Sierra foothills and up to the
mountains to examine water issues that happen upstream but have
dramatic impacts downstream and throughout California.
This winter’s wild swings in weather
– an early lack of rain, then late-season Sierra snowstorms,
followed by a torrent of subtropical moisture – shows the need in
California for long-range tools to better manage water supply.
At a Paleo
Drought Workshop in San Pedro on April 19, six experts will
discuss research on centuries-long precipitation and streamflow
records, new forecasting tools and planning strategies to help
reduce Southern California’s vulnerability to drought.
For decades, cannabis has been grown
in California – hidden away in forested groves or surreptitiously
harvested under the glare of high-intensity indoor lamps in
suburban tract homes.
In the past 20 years, however, cannabis – known more widely as
marijuana – has been moving from being a criminal activity to
gaining legitimacy as one of the hundreds of cash crops in the
state’s $46 billion-dollar agriculture industry, first legalized
for medicinal purposes and this year for recreational use.
The Sacramento-San Joaquin Delta,
the largest estuary on the West Coast, is a vital hub in
California’s complex water delivery system as well as a rich
farming region, an important wetlands area – and often, a source
of conflict.
Our Bay-Delta Tour, May
16-18, will allow participants to hear from a diverse group
of experts, including water managers, environmentalists, farmers,
engineers and scientists who will offer different perspectives on
the proposed tunnels project, efforts to revitalize the Delta,
and risks that threaten its delicate ecological balance. (The
controversial tunnels project got a boost this week when
Metropolitan Water District of Southern California
voted Tuesday to cover nearly $11 billion of the construction
cost).
Formerly known as the Executive Briefing, this year’s
Water Summit will feature top policymakers and others sharing
the latest information on key issues affecting water in
California and the Southwest.
The day-long event on Sept. 20 is the Foundation’s premiere event
of the year, and will be held at the Westin Riverside in
Sacramento. Look for more details and speaker announcements
coming soon!
In the meantime, secure a sponsorship opportunity and gain
publicity for your organization by sponsoring lunch or the
evening reception along the beautiful Sacramento River.
