Chris writes:
> Wow! That's horrifying and completely unsustainable. Are they trying to create a desert?

California IS mostly a desert, supplied by a monumental irrigation
system, which pipes water from as far away as the Rocky Mountains.
(see: www.biogeographer.com/F53.gif )

The fact that almonds do well in the Big Valley should be a tip off.
The climate is much like central Spain, which is second only to
California in almond production; followed by Syria, Italy, Iran, and
Morocco.

The need for honey bees to pollinate California almonds is currently
almost 1.5 million colonies. According to the Almond Board of
California, the number may top 2 million in four years. It is
estimated that beekeepers in California have 500,000 beehive colonies
to pollinate California's almond acreage. This means more than half of
the necessary bees must be brought from out of state.

California's Central Valley has a hot Mediterranean climate. It is hot
and dry during the summer and cool and damp in winter. Summer
temperatures reach into the mid to upper 90s°F (30s°C), and occasional
heat waves might bring temperatures well over 100°F (38°C), with some
locations topping out at around 115°F (46°C).

Winter and spring comprise the rainy season. The northern half of the
Central Valley (the Sacramento Valley) has more precipitation than the
dryer southern San Joaquin Valley. Annual precipitation totals 15
inches in parts of the Sacramento Valley and to less than 8 inches
over most of the San Joaquin Valley.

* * *
From the LA Times, July 13, 2007:

> IF YOU LIKE IT hot and dry and live in Southern California, you could be in luck. Our combination of an arid winter, scorching summer and host of wildfires may not be a short-term aberration. Consider the possibility of decades of dry, hot weather, stretching from Southern California to the headwaters of the Sacramento and Colorado river systems -- the lifelines that allow us to flourish in our arid to semi-arid landscape. That is the nature of a "perfect drought," and new research regarding a past episode of climate warming tells us we could be on the brink of a new one.

> Historical climate records show that such prolonged droughts can and do occur. The last one began in the late 1980s and ended in the early 1990s. California dried at the same time that the flow of the Colorado River declined by almost 40%. Oceanic and atmospheric measurements tell us that this blast of hyper-aridity was associated with depressed temperatures in the eastern Pacific, sort of a persistent La Niña condition. In 1992, the rain and snow returned. However, during 1990 and 1991 alone, the drought cost California an estimated $2 billion in agriculture losses, increased energy costs and damage to the environment. ( Glen M. MacDonald, professor of geography and ecology and evolutionary biology at UCLA )


-- 
Peter

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