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California's water myths and facts

Coalition response...This author continues to point toward water exports as the blame for population decreases for fish in the Delta. He fails to add the list of stressors that scientists are in agreement with, namely, predators, water quality, loss of food and habitat. He conveniently ignores that California Department of Fish and Game biologists estimate that striped bass devour up to 50% of juvenile salmon. He also does not mention the millions of gallons of wastewater loaded with ammonia that is dumped into the water flowing to the Delta.

The author also introduces the suggestion that Californians can save "trillions of gallons of water" by altering their water use practices. Conveniently he does not mention a Center for Irrigation Technology report released in November that puts agricultural water use efficiency potential at about 330,000 acre-feet. Obegi's overly optimistic numbers come from an old CalFed report that admitted almost 3 million acre feet of agricultural "conservation" potential would mostly be the result of shorting other users, which is not true conservation.