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Ag board hears farmer’s plight; Irrigation cuts have cost $830 million in farm revenue

Posted by: Aqua Blog Maven on July 2, 2009 at 2:05 pm

From the Capital Press:

Corporate ag can have dirty boots too. To be sure, there are plenty of large-scale farms on the San Joaquin Valley’s west side and some, even though they are family owned, are corporations. In many instances the farms are owned and operated by people like Bob Diedrich, who took time June 24 to tell members of the state’s board of food and agriculture what restrictive water policies have done to his livelihood.

Diedrich, a fourth-generation farmer, normally grows almonds, tomatoes, garlic, onions, beans, cantaloupes and wheat on 1,100 acres on the west side of Fresno County. This year he’s down to 400 acres, hoping to save a block of five-year-old almond trees.

The announcement that federal water deliveries to the valley’s west side water districts would be 10 percent of normal this year has had large and small growers scrambling for water to irrigate their crops. A third year of drought has reduced run-off from the Sierra, but restrictions on pumping water from the Sacramento-San Joaquin Delta to protect several species of fish have many farmers calling this year’s shortage a “man-made drought.”

Read more from the Capital Press by clicking here.

July 2, 2009 · Filed Under Agriculture, Drought, Weather & Snowpack

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