California's nuts

[Gob]

California's worst drought for more than a century is causing huge problems for farmers, who need a trillion gallons of water per year for their almond orchards alone.



But it also leaves homeowners facing difficult choices about what to do with their lawn. I have a neighbour, Deborah, and ever since I've lived here, her front lawn has been luxuriant and green.
But wandering by the other day I did a double take. Mounds of earth were piled up where the grass had once been, and an army of workmen had set about installing succulent plants and ground cover, and the kind of prickly cactus you normally see in children's cartoons. By the time Deborah had finished explaining why she was doing it, I could hardly believe I hadn't done the same thing myself.

Aside from the satisfaction of knowing you are planting something that is actually meant to grow in these desert-like conditions - as opposed to grass, which sucks up water with the zeal of an inebriate who has stumbled upon the keys to the drinks cabinet - she also stands to save a fortune on her water bill. She even avoids having to confront a sorry, burned-out apology-for-a-front-lawn every time she leaves the house.
Added to which, the city of Los Angeles actually paid her to do it - generously too, by all accounts. And if paying people to rip up their lawns and replace them with drought-tolerant plants strikes you as an odd use of government resources, then all I can say to you is that desperate times call for desperate measures - and these are desperate times.

California is now in its third year of drought. The reservoirs are running dry and so too are the ground water supplies.

While comedians joke that it's so dry in California these days that the longest lines at Disneyland are for the water fountains - or ponder replacing the bear on the California state flag with a camel - what this place is witnessing is a dust bowl of truly Steinbeckian proportions. It's so dry, in fact, that officials were reportedly thinking of adding a fifth level to the current four-tiered drought scale, which currently rates 99% of the state as "abnormally dry".

But while replacing your lawn with plants does help save water, the vast majority of the water used here goes not to households but to support California's economic mainstay - agriculture. So water-intensive is the industry that the benefits of planting the odd cactus here or there start to seem a little modest in comparison.

Take almonds. In recent recent years the little nut with the hard brown shell has been touted as the holy grail of healthy snacks. Whether you're seeking a slimmer body, or a smoother skin, or you just want to spend a little longer on the planet, almonds are for you. They've been touted as a remedy for cancer, arthritis, heart disease and even Alzheimer's. Not surprisingly, perhaps, given their growing fan base, the farmers of California's Central Valley have been planting them like there's no tomorrow.

Getting on for a million acres are now given over to almond trees, and such is the nurturing nature of California's Mediterranean climate that this state now accounts for more than 80% of the global supply. The problem is that California's entire almond crop commands a stunning 1.1 trillion gallons of water every single year.
That's twice as much as it takes to grow cotton or tomatoes, and enough - I am reliably informed - for you or me to take a 10-minute shower every day for the next 86 million years. Added to which, it's not as if this nutty elixir is being produced to satisfy local demand. Nearly 70% of the almonds produced in California are for export. And where do most of them end up? China.

This does little to quell criticism that the Chinese - with their booming economy - may soon, quite literally, be sucking this place dry.

Predictably perhaps, there have been calls to scale back on almond farming - at least until the rains return. As for those front lawns, my neighbour Deborah may have started a trend. Now that weekly watering restrictions have been introduced, others in the street are considering cashing in and planting cactus and succulents instead. In the meantime, "brown is the new green" around here. I have to admit, however, it's painfully difficult to stop watering your grass. Hence the "dawn chorus" in these parts is not so much the sound of birdsong, as the subtle hiss of sprinkler systems engaging in a furtive nocturnal ritual.

Judging by how lush some of the lawns are around here one might almost be tempted to think some are bending the rules. "Almost" being the operative word - I have to live here, after all.

[Joe Guy]

I have a green lawn because I have my own water well. So far, the well hasn't been affected by the drought. Which leads me to believe that I have a drought solution.

Drill for water!!! It's time to invest in water wells. The oil of the future. I'm gonna be rich.

[Econoline]

Meanwhile, the oiligarchs are racing to use/pollute as much ground water (which we can drink, and water crops with) as they want--to extract the last remaining bits of fossil fuels (which can neither drink nor water crops with) from the planet.




Edited just for the sake of editing, and 'cuz I can never leave well enough alone.

[Lord Jim]

We've had a nice dousing over the past three days, on top of a little last week and the week before...

The result is that the grass on the green areas out here, (which had turned completely brown due to the policy ending the use of sprinklers on public land) is rebounding nicely...

But we need a helluvalot more between now and March...

[BoSoxGal]

I don't understand why this drought isn't convincing more Californians that it's time to trade in lawns for xeroscaping.

[rubato]

Xeriscaping. And it has become much more common since the devastating drought of '76-'77 followed by the less severe but longer drought of the 1980s. As water becomes more valuable we change our behavior and use less of it frivolously. A lot of people are focusing on planting native plants like Sage and Manzanita, or less thirsty non-natives like lavenders.

"You don't miss your water until the well runs dry."

I have a colleague who lives in Merced; she drives up on Monday and works until Friday staying in a shared rented room. Her home has a well which went totally dry this year and she is faced with a bill of $20,000 to drill another. For the time being she is getting by with water she brings from her daughter's house for cooking and bathing. But her well went dry because agri-business pumped the aquifier down below the level of her well and they will continue to do so until they are regulated.

It is a pretty tough situation for a lot of people. We have had rationing here in Santa Cruz this year. We never use even 1/2 of our allotment and last month drove it down to 1/4. But it might be worse next year.

yrs,
rubato

[wesw]

well after keystone is finished, maybe those nice Canadians will ok another pipeline and give you some melting glacier water...

[oldr_n_wsr]

I never water my lawn, nor do I use fertilizer. Crabgrass, clover and weeds make out ok. and they are green

[Beer Sponge]

if it's green, mow it!

[wesw]

I like clover and dandelions myself older. a bit of color and sweetly scented flowers are ok with me. I grow a garden so the crabgrass isn t my favorite weed.

[oldr_n_wsr]

One has to pull the crabgrass out of the garden for sure. But on the open space, I allow it free reign. Dandilions I pull out. For a while I let them be, but they got out of control to the point of smothering much of the crabgrass. I used to pay my children $5 a bucket to pull them out. They made out like bandits. Now I have this dandilion puller called the "WeedHound".

[wesw]

I have some patches of nice lush green grass that some one planted a long time ago, its harder to cut........