Drought, Water Law, and the Origins of California's Central Valley Project

Drought, Water Law, and the Origins of California's Central Valley Project
Title Drought, Water Law, and the Origins of California's Central Valley Project PDF eBook
Author Tim Stroshane
Publisher University of Nevada Press
Pages 401
Release 2016-10-27
Genre Nature
ISBN 087417001X

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This book is an account of how water rights were designed as a key part of the state’s largest public water system, the Central Valley Project. Along sixty miles of the San Joaquin River, from Gustine to Mendota, four corporate entities called “exchange contractors” retain paramount water rights to the river. Their rights descend from the days of the Miller & Lux Cattle Company, which amassed an empire of land and water from the 1850s through the 1920s and protected these assets through business deals and prolific litigation. Miller & Lux’s dominance of the river relied on what many in the San Joaquin Valley regarded as wasteful irrigation practices and unreasonable water usage. Economic and political power in California’s present water system was born of this monopoly on water control. Stroshane tells how drought and legal conflict shaped statewide economic development and how the grand bargain of a San Joaquin River water exchange was struck from this monopoly legacy, setting the stage for future water wars. His analysis will appeal to readers interested in environmental studies and public policy.

Drought, Water Law, and the Origins of California's Central Valley Project

Drought, Water Law, and the Origins of California's Central Valley Project
Title Drought, Water Law, and the Origins of California's Central Valley Project PDF eBook
Author Tim Stroshane
Publisher University of Nevada Press
Pages 246
Release 2017-06-30
Genre Nature
ISBN 9781943859061

Download Drought, Water Law, and the Origins of California's Central Valley Project Book in PDF, Epub and Kindle

This book is an account of how water rights were designed as a key part of the state’s largest public water system, the Central Valley Project. Along sixty miles of the San Joaquin River, from Gustine to Mendota, four corporate entities called “exchange contractors” retain paramount water rights to the river. Their rights descend from the days of the Miller & Lux Cattle Company, which amassed an empire of land and water from the 1850s through the 1920s and protected these assets through business deals and prolific litigation. Miller & Lux’s dominance of the river relied on what many in the San Joaquin Valley regarded as wasteful irrigation practices and unreasonable water usage. Economic and political power in California’s present water system was born of this monopoly on water control. Stroshane tells how drought and legal conflict shaped statewide economic development and how the grand bargain of a San Joaquin River water exchange was struck from this monopoly legacy, setting the stage for future water wars. His analysis will appeal to readers interested in environmental studies and public policy.

The Central Valley Project

The Central Valley Project
Title The Central Valley Project PDF eBook
Author
Publisher
Pages 182
Release 1942
Genre Central Valley Project (California)
ISBN

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Description of the water systems in the Central Valley, the effects of floods and droughts, and the dams built to control the water supply. Intended for school students.

The Great Central Valley

The Great Central Valley
Title The Great Central Valley PDF eBook
Author Gerald W. Haslam
Publisher Univ of California Press
Pages 278
Release 1993
Genre CALIFORNIA.
ISBN 0520064119

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Explores the natural and social history of California's agricultural heartland. This book celebrates the tenacious people of the Valley, where hard work and ingenuity are the means to both survival and success.

The Dreamt Land

The Dreamt Land
Title The Dreamt Land PDF eBook
Author Mark Arax
Publisher Vintage
Pages 577
Release 2019-05-21
Genre Nature
ISBN 1101875216

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A vivid, searching journey into California's capture of water and soil—the epic story of a people's defiance of nature and the wonders, and ruin, it has wrought Mark Arax is from a family of Central Valley farmers, a writer with deep ties to the land who has watched the battles over water intensify even as California lurches from drought to flood and back again. In The Dreamt Land, he travels the state to explore the one-of-a-kind distribution system, built in the 1940s, '50s and '60s, that is straining to keep up with California's relentless growth. The Dreamt Land weaves reportage, history and memoir to confront the "Golden State" myth in riveting fashion. No other chronicler of the West has so deeply delved into the empires of agriculture that drink so much of the water. The nation's biggest farmers—the nut king, grape king and citrus queen—tell their story here for the first time. Arax, the native son, is persistent and tough as he treks from desert to delta, mountain to valley. What he finds is hard earned, awe-inspiring, tragic and revelatory. In the end, his compassion for the land becomes an elegy to the dream that created California and now threatens to undo it.

Trinity River Division

Trinity River Division
Title Trinity River Division PDF eBook
Author United States. Bureau of Reclamation
Publisher
Pages 18
Release 1970
Genre Trinity River (Calif.)
ISBN

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The Fall and Rise of the Wetlands of California's Great Central Valley

The Fall and Rise of the Wetlands of California's Great Central Valley
Title The Fall and Rise of the Wetlands of California's Great Central Valley PDF eBook
Author Philip Garone
Publisher University of California Press
Pages 440
Release 2020-03-03
Genre Nature
ISBN 0520355571

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This is the first comprehensive environmental history of California’s Great Central Valley, where extensive freshwater and tidal wetlands once provided critical habitat for tens of millions of migratory waterfowl. Weaving together ecology, grassroots politics, and public policy, Philip Garone tells how California’s wetlands were nearly obliterated by vast irrigation and reclamation projects, but have been brought back from the brink of total destruction by the organized efforts of duck hunters, whistle-blowing scientists, and a broad coalition of conservationists. Garone examines the many demands that have been made on the Valley’s natural resources, especially by large-scale agriculture, and traces the unforeseen ecological consequences of our unrestrained manipulation of nature. He also investigates changing public and scientific attitudes that are now ushering in an era of unprecedented protection for wildlife and wetlands in California and the nation.