Posted on 03/10/2025 2:15:36 PM PDT by E. Pluribus Unum
The sprawling estuary about 70 miles inland from San Francisco feels distinctly out of place — more like the swampy Florida Everglades than arid California. But from that confluence of two great rivers, the Sacramento and the San Joaquin, 1,100 miles of webbed waterways and levees send upward of six million acre-feet of freshwater a year to thirstier parts of the state, from farms in the San Joaquin Valley to the Southern California megalopolis. Known as the California Delta, the estuary is among the state’s most important sources of water — and most consistent flash points over environmental protection.
Donald Trump first saw the political utility of the estuary in 2016 on the campaign trail, when he denied the existence of a drought in California, claiming that the state had wasted its precious freshwater by sending it into the ocean. He was referring to a fight over diverting water from the Delta to protect a native fish species called the delta smelt, and he was implicitly siding with farmers who argued they were more deserving of the water than the federally threatened species. He revisited this battle in his first term as president, but environmentalists stopped him in the courts from redirecting more water to farmers.
This January, he waded back into the issue, accusing California Democrats of prioritizing the delta smelt over helping Los Angeles fight out-of-control wildfires, even though water from the estuary would most likely not have made a difference for firefighters. He used the fires to implicitly challenge legal protections of endangered species and in a memo gave the secretaries of commerce and the interior 90 days to find ways to divert more Delta water for cities and farms that he claimed “desperately need” it.
For Mr. Trump and some conservatives, the...
(Excerpt) Read more at nytimes.com ...
https://www.valleyagvoice.com/the-problem-with-misrepresenting-science/
Delta smelt has cost valley farmers, rural communities, and residents in Southern California significant quantities of water...
...Delta smelt have attracted attention recently because one of the management actions intended to improve their habitat was recently suspended. This action, referred to as Fall X2, has been reported in the last two issues of Valley Voice. As noted previously, this action, which requires a reduction in water exports from the Delta, was intended to increase the volume of water in suitable salinity ranges available to delta smelt in September and October in years of above normal hydrology...
...The wealth of scientific evidence, including the scientists in the US Fish and Wildlife Service, and findings from four quantitative models representing the best available science, found no benefit for the Fall X2 action. Thus, there is no threat to the fish by suspending the action. There is no evidence to suggest the additional water in some years has provided important benefits for the fish. Suspending the action was both responsible and defensible. The claims of the environmental organizations were baseless.
I don’t think the Delta is like the Everglades.
I'll put our California Nutria up against any gator from the Everglades any day of the week!
Yes. Travel up or down Central Valley interstate or freeways and there all are sorts of anti-Democrat, pro-Trump, pro-Water billboards.
Been like that for decades.
Congress Created Dustbowl.
Delta is great.
I think it’s more like Mississippi River regions than tropical swampy Everglades.
They used to use the Sacramento as a stand in for the Mississippi when making movies.
Yep. Everywhere.
Eastern Washington State in the Palouse Region is covered in “NO WIND FARM” signs.
People everywhere hate the GD government and its policies that hurt everyday normal hard-working people.
It feels distinctly out of place.
That's reality? That's science? Isn't the NYT a bastion of "science" ?
“I think it’s more like Mississippi River regions than tropical swampy Everglades.”
Maybe a little of both, but also much cooler than both.
Very easy to get lost in the maze of islands and waterways. But also major deep water ship channels.
I first fished it when I was 6yrs old with grandpa and dad. I didn’t know the world could be so big as to hold “the delta”. At least a thousand miles of shoreline...laid out in a complex maze.
Actually gators consider Nutria a culinary delicacy. I was a swamp boy once in South Louisiana, we have both.
And it wouldn’t exist without all the levees all over the place. It’s so weird in the Stockton port to see a big ship ABOVE you in your car on the adjacent road.
I”m reading an old book “Bonanza Railroads” about short line railroads in the west. The first chapter is about the competition to build a railroad to the silver mines in the Comstock Lode before the transcontinental. In the early 1850s, there were already handmade levees in Sacramento! One railroad charged the steamship freight carriers a fee to cross their levee to unload cargo, so they built a new port up the Sacramento River to unload tariff-free.
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