The January Colorado River forecast for 2009-10, out last Friday, is the lowest at this point in the year since 2002-03: The range of uncertainty right now is enormous. In an average year, about 8 million acre feet flows into Lake Powell in the April-July period, which is the peak of the runoff season. This …
Tramway (Not So) Wetlands Originally uploaded by heinemanfleck. January’s a time of quiet and anticipation. What water there is in our rivers is mostly what they call “base flow”, which is really just the surface manifestation of groundwater leaking into the river channel. Or they’re just dry. The runoff to come is frozen in the …
Green Gold? (more in Sunday’s paper)
James Rickman has launched a new photoblog to document the wonder that is his home town.
About five seconds with the google is enough to make one question the old alleged Twain chestnut: “Whiskey’s for drinking, water’s for fighting about.” Is that too much to ask, Mark Strassman? Especially given how not only factually wrong but conceptually misleading the reference is? Whiskey, yes, but water is frequently not for fighting about, …
Southwest Hydrology, the invaluable University of Arizona publication that is a frequent starting point when I’m researching an unfamiliar water topic, has lost its National Science Foundation funding and will be closed, Shaun McKinnon reports: The magazine’s demise was announced in notes written by founding editor, Betsy Woodhouse and Gary Woodard, associate director of the …
In my book, The Tree Rings’ Tale, in addition to sharing the stories of scientists I tried to give young readers examples of science they can do themselves. As a science journalist, I got hooked on weather years ago because the sciency bits connect so nicely to readers’ everyday experience. It’s just one short step, …
It has long been apparent that the water supply of the Colorado is inadequate for all the demands that will be made upon it, as is the case with many other streams in the West. That is G.E.P. Smith of the University of Arizona, writing in the Proceedings of the American Society of Civil Engineers …
2009 was the first full year I’ve been thorough in keeping track of my yard birds. We always looked idly out and enjoyed them, especially since Lissa built me a pond a while back for my birthday. But in 2009, I kept lists. Sometimes it was an hour on a summer evening sitting at the …
Continue reading ‘2009: The Heineman-Fleck House Yard List’ »
As an addendum to Emily Green’s year-end look at Lake Mead (High good, low bad) I’d like to extend the analysis back a bit farther in time. Emily points out that, while population has risen over the past decade in the region served by Mead (one of the two large storage reservoirs on the Colorado), …