April 10, 2015 CapitalPress.com Subscribe to our weekly California email newsletter at CapitalPress.com/newsletters 9 California Ag water providers must have drought plan By TIM HEARDEN Capital Press SACRAMENTO — Gov. Jerry Brown boosted reporting requirements for agricultural water users April 1 while his administration deflected criti- cism that farmers were mostly spared from his latest measures to help California withstand the drought. Amid a wide-reaching ex- ecutive order, Brown told state water regulators to require more frequent reporting of water di- versions and use by water right holders, conduct inspections and crack down further on ille- gal diversions and wasteful use of water. Agricultural water provid- ers serving more than 10,000 acres are required to develop drought management plans that detail how the districts “strike a balance between supplies and demand,” said Mark Cowin, di- rector of the state Department of Water Resources. Additionally, local water agencies in high- and medi- um-risk groundwater basins must immediately implement a groundwater monitoring program. “It’s obvious that we’re clearly in a drought that we’ve not seen before, and neither have our parents or grandparents, so Sticky cotton prevention tips offered By TIM HEARDEN Capital Press DAVIS, Calif. — Researcher Peter Goodell compares cases of sticky cotton to buying a child some cotton candy at a fair. Pretty soon, he said, a sticky residue is all over the child’s clothes, the back seat of the car and everything the little boy or girl touches, he said. The same mess is created by sticky cotton, which is caused by invasions of whiteflies that se- crete honeydew on open cotton bolls. “Sticky cotton affects spinning mills,” Goodell said recently in a webinar for growers. “With a sticky deposit, they’ll start to col- lect more and more loose cotton … This is the kind of issue that will shut the system down.” Frequent observations and tests in fields, taking advantage of natural enemies and knowing when to apply pesticides are keys to controlling whitefly invasions, explained Goodell, a University of California Cooperative Exten- sion integrated pest management adviser based in Parlier, Calif. The sweet potato whitefly was first found in the San Joaquin Valley in 1992, according to a UC news release. Growers have controlled the pest reasonably well since then, but the pest’s in- vasions have become more of a problem in the last several years. One potential reason may be heat. Generational turnover of whiteflies happens quickly, and in warm years such as the ones California has seen during the drought, the turnover is more rapid. Whiteflies can directly dam- age plants by extracting proteins from plant sap, then the sticky sugars they leave behind can be a boon to fungi, Goodell said. An outbreak of sticky cotton can shut a mill down for a week, and the reputation hit from pro- ducing contaminated cotton can take years for an area to over- come, he said. “Producing high-quality cot- ton in California requires that they be free of contaminants,” he said. Goodell advises that grow- ers defoliate as quickly as pos- sible to control insects and that they manage water and nitro- gen to avoid excess late-season growth. Growers should sam- ple leaves early in the season to determine if an invasion has occurred, and use selective in- secticides in the early phase of an invasion to preserve natural enemies. To know how best to treat for the pest as the season goes along, Goodell encourages growers to consult a worksheet developed by extension advis- ers. The worksheet can be found at http://ucanr.edu/blogs/Green/ blogfiles/28455.pdf. we have to take measures we ha- ven’t taken before,” State Water Resources Control Board chair- woman Felicia Marcus said in a conference call with reporters. The ag-related measures come amid instructions from Brown that mostly center around urban water use, includ- ing a mandate that cities reduce their consumption by 25 per- cent compared to 2013 levels and that state and local agencies replace 50 million square feet of lawns with drought-tolerant landscapes. “Last year the governor asked all Californians to re- duce their water use by 20 per- cent, but unfortunately many haven’t stepped up to meet that goal,” said Mark Ghilarducci, director of California’s Office of Emergency Services. “Now with no snow in the mountains and with reservoirs getting lower by the day, it’s really time to do more.” Marcus and other officials deflected criticism that Brown isn’t requiring farmers to do more to conserve. For instance, Restore the Delta executive di- rector Barbara Barrigan-Paril- la asserted in a statement that Brown places “the largest bur- den of conservation on urban water users” while refusing to deal with “the insatiable de- mands of big agribusiness grow- Courtesy of Calif. Dept. of Water Resources California Gov. Jerry Brown, right, watches as Department of Water Resources snow surveys chief Frank Gehrke conducts a manual snow survey April 1 at Phillips Station east of Sacramento. The state’s third manual snow survey of the season found virtually no snow. ers on the west side of the San Joaquin Valley.” State officials noted the farmers’ water supplies have al- ready been drastically cut back, as many growers will get no federal water, only 20 percent of their normal supplies of state water or face curtailment notices if they have a junior water right. “Everyone knows that the drought is especially a hard hit for agriculture,” said state Food and Agriculture secre- tary Karen Ross, adding that growers fallowed more than 400,000 acres last year and the drought caused the loss of 17,000 ag-related jobs. Water shortages will cause growers to take out more trees and vines this year, she said. “It’s farm and wage in- come that’s not going to be spent in these rural communi- ties,” she said. Agricultural water suppliers that cover more than 25,000 acres have been required since 2009 to submit water manage- ment plans to the state. Brown’s order adds a mandate for a de- tailed drought plan and applies the rules to smaller water dis- tricts, too. Plans must include details of how much water was used in 2013, 2014 and 2015 and de- scribe actions the water district is taking to manage demand during the drought. The state will provide technical assis- tance and funding, prioritizing grants to smaller districts, ac- cording to the order. Other details of how the or- der will be implemented will be worked out in the coming weeks by the water board and Depart- ment of Water Resources. Brown issued the order as he accompanied Cowin and snow surveys chief Frank Gehrke on the third manual snow survey of the season near Echo Summit 90 miles east of Sacramento, where they found no snow on the ground for the first time in the test site’s 75- year history. California’s snowpack typi- cally supplies about 30 percent of the state’s water needs as it melts in the spring and sum- mer, but statewide electronic readings April 1 found only 1.4 inches of water content, or 5 percent of the historical average of 28.3 inches for the date, the DWR reported. Senior water right holder usage suspended By TIM HEARDEN Capital Press SACRAMENTO — The state warns that more stop-di- version orders loom for water right holders throughout Cal- ifornia — and this time it may curtail some senior rights. The State Water Resources Control Board sent warning letters to some 36,000 land- owners and other entities that their rights to take water from rivers and streams will soon be suspended in key watersheds because of the drought. The warnings are the agen- cy’s second this year and are designed to give water right holders advance notice to help them make difficult planting de- cisions this spring, officials said. “We’re monitoring the water in the streams, the availability of water and the expected demand,” water board spokesman Tim Mo- ran told the Capital Press. “We don’t know how many or if” senior right holders will be told to stop diverting, he said. “We’re just giving them a warn- ing that this could happen. It real- ly depends on how much water is in the watershed and what we see is the projected demand.” The letters portend a repeat of last year, when curtailments impacted more than 5,000 water rights, according to the board. While the curtailments pre- dominantly affect agriculture, they also apply to water rights held by municipalities and other water users, officials noted in a news release. If dry conditions continue through the spring, curtailments are likely in certain watersheds on all post-1914 water rights, and many holders of pre-1914 rights could also be affected. If senior right holders are curtailed, offi- cials would “work backwards by date,” Moran said. “If we get through all the ju- niors and there’s still not enough water in the system, it would like- ly kick over to seniors,” he said. The warnings come as Gov. Jerry Brown issued a mandate last week that cities reduce their water consumption by 25 percent compared to 2013 levels and that state and local agencies replace 50 million square feet of lawns with drought-tolerant landscapes. The governor’s wide-reach- ing executive order largely spared agriculture, although Brown did boost various report- ing requirements for agricultural water users. For instance, the governor told state water regula- tors to require more frequent re- porting of water diversions and use by water right holders, con- duct inspections and crack down further on illegal diversions and wasteful use of water. John Deere Dealers See one of these dealers for a demonstration 15-4/#4N