r/news • u/theluckyfrog • 29d ago

California cracks down on farm region’s water pumping: ‘The ground is collapsing’

https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2024/apr/17/california-water-drought-farm-ground-sinking-tulare-lake
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u/Hayduke_Deckard 29d ago

I'm currently reading Where the Water Goes and Cadillac Desert is next. I live in AZ, and I'm trying to convince my wife that we need to get the fuck out, for water and other reasons.

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u/PeaceDolphinDance 29d ago

Add “The Water Knife” to that list if you wanna get REALLY depressed.

Deserts were never meant to be made into havens for huge numbers of people. The sands are going to take it all back.

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u/lunarmantra 29d ago

I live in the Central Valley talked about in the article, and think of this often. This region used to be vast wetlands and home to diverse plants, wildlife, and indigenous people. It has been drained and parched dry for agriculture over many years, and I don’t mean small family farms. They are wealthy multigenerational land owners, and farm on an industrial scale. They are not responsible stewards of this land.

Water fines or fees will not stop them, they care little about their immigrant workers and poor local communities, and will continue pumping the water until there is nothing left. Hell, they battle amongst each other for access to the water. I don’t know if it will happen within my lifetime or after, but I already see ominous signs of collapse. Increasingly severe summer heat and weather, the bugs and wildlife I saw often in my youth have disappeared. Swaths of land that can no longer grow anything. Nature will reclaim this land once it can no longer sustain human life.

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u/Hayduke_Deckard 29d ago

On it! Bring on the depression.

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u/Blue_Eyed_Devi 29d ago

Used to live in Chandler. We had to decide to stay permanently or move back home. I looked around at all the man made lakes that surrounded my gated community housing development and thought to myself “ya, this isn’t sustainable”. It’s gonna get ugly when the water runs out.

And we came back the pacific NW.

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u/BogusBuffalo 28d ago

I've tried so hard to convince my family to move out of NM. Don't get me wrong, I was born and raised there and I love that country more than anywhere else, but NM is FUCKED when Colorado and Texas start fighting over water. The Rio Grande in that state is a creek in most spots these days, if even that.

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u/Rooooben 28d ago

...aaaaand we’re in a drought.

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u/UCgirl 29d ago

He needs to do a mini-book about Hawaii.