[Water_news] 3. DWR'S CALIFORNIA WATER NEWS: WATERSHEDS - 2/03/09

Department of Water Resources

California Water News

A daily compilation of significant news articles and comment

 

February 03, 2009

 

3. Watersheds –

 

 

District reaching out to Interior

Inland Valley Press

 

Boaters asked to help clean up mussels

Riverside Press Enterprise

 

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District reaching out to Interior

Inland Valley Press – 2/2/09

By Megan Bakker

While it’s too soon to tell whether a new secretary of the Interior will bring any changes for the Imperial Valley, board members and staff from the Imperial Irrigation District have already taken steps to bend Secretary Ken Salazar’s ear on Valley issues.

Kevin Kelley, a spokesman for the IID, said that the district has already started organizing a possible visit for the new secretary.

“He can see firsthand the initiatives that we are pursuing,” Kelley said, about the district’s water conservation efforts.

Salazar, who took over from former Secretary of the Interior Dirk Kempthorne, was a U.S. senator from Colorado before taking the new post with the Obama administration. According to the Department of the Interior’s Web site, Salazar was raised on a ranch and worked as a farmer for more than 30 years. He also worked for 11 years as a water and environmental lawyer.

This makes him very familiar with the West’s water issues, which Salazar will be in charge of.

“We see Salazar as the fresh face of the new administration,” Kelley said.

The new focus is important as the tug between energy independence and water will only intensify.

One of former President Bush’s last-minute actions in office included drafting a plan to develop mining for oil in the shale of Colorado, to get the country off of foreign oil. A recent study determined that Colorado’s energy industry would need 15 times the water that it uses now to start mining — the equivalent of completely shutting off the Colorado River for six weeks, according to published reports.

While Salazar is expected to delay the mining plans — he fought for a moratorium on the mining as a senator — several other groups are already lobbying to go forward.

Kelley said he anticipates that Salazar will work to preserve water agreements already in place. He also said that the Colorado yields only 15 million acre-feet a year between its upper and lower basin.

“It’s a delicate balancing act,” Kelley said of states’ water rights.#

http://www.ivpressonline.com/articles/2009/02/03/local_news/news03.txt

 

Boaters asked to help clean up mussels

Riverside Press Enterprise – 2/2/09

By DAVID DANELSKI

State boating and wildlife officials hope to enlist Inland boaters in their battle against invasive Quagga and zebra mussels that harm native aquatic life and clog pipes and pumps needed to keep water flowing to Southern California.

 

Boaters can help by making sure they don't inadvertently carry mussels or their microscopic larvae, called veligers, as they move their boats through waterways. The state has scheduled a seminar this week in Riverside to get across the message.

 

"We want them to clean, drain and dry their boats," said Dan Schrimsher, a wildlife biologist for the California Department of Fish and Game.

 

The mollusks, native to the Black and Caspian seas in Eastern Europe, were found in the Great Lakes in 1988, most likely hitching rides in ship ballast water. By 2007, the mussels had been discovered in Lake Mead, and since have turned up in Lake Mathews and Lake Skinner, both in Riverside County, among other locations.

The zebra mussel made it to California last year, but so far have been found only in San Justo Lake in San Benito County, according to fish and game officials.

The mussels harm native wildlife by eating plankton, the foundation of the food chain for aquatic life within a body of water. Declines of Chinook salmon and white fish in the Great Lakes have been blamed on the mussels, Schrimsher said.

 

The mussels are a $10 mil- lion-a-year headache for the Metropolitan Water District of Southern California because they clog pipes, pumps and filters in reservoirs and waterways, said Ric De Leon, the district's microbiology unit manager.

http://www.pe.com/localnews/inland/stories/PE_News_Local_S_mussels03.2dd5210.html

 

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