August 25, 2016

• A River Ran Through It

  Those of you who have followed my blog for any length of time know that I grew up in Santa Barbara, and have friends and family who still live there.  When I go to visit, one of the things I enjoy doing is driving over the mountains to the Santa Ynez Valley.  The Santa Ynez River was dammed in the mid 1950's to create a flood control center for the river as well as a reservoir for water flowing down the river.  Over the last 5 years of drought, the area has seen the lake (Lake Cachuma) diminished considerably in its ability to supply the city with water, and there are actually beginning to be some water rights spats over what little water remains in the lake.  This trip, I was shocked to see how much the lake level had dropped since May, when I was there last, and now -- particularly visible in the shots closest to the dam.  Also shocking was the fact that you can now see the path of the river as it was before there was a dam.  As I usually do, I stopped along the road on the way to a County viewpoint and looked across the lake as well as upstream to the County Park.  The first few shots replicate those I've shown before, albeit with considerably less water in the lake.

  

  The next shot, in particular, shows the river snaking through the sandbars off to the left.  The towers on the right side of the photo are part of the County Park.  And most of the water line shows the decline since May.

  

  

  

  The dark line on the left side of this shot is shrubbery regrown since May.

  

  

  Moving on to the vista point, one has another view of the lake.

  

  

  Peeking through the oak trees, I was able to glimpse a pump sitting on a barge.  I believe this is one used to pump water downstream, past the dam, for the senior rights users (Solvang, Buellton, and Lompoc,  and a few farms have senior rights to the water because they were there before the river was dammed).  There is a similar pump that is lifting the water to the entrance to a tunnel that takes the water through the mountains to a reservoir in the hills behind Santa Barbara.

  

  Water being released down the river will add to the aquafer, but it is also being used for normal life.  We had lunch at a golf course belonging to a private "dude ranch" near Solvang.  There are also horse ranches and some agricultural fields along the river that are beautifully irrigated with this released water.  The residents along the river maintain that the water is theirs because they were there first, and that Santa Barbara has been stealing the water all these years!

  

  

  

  Looking across the dam you can also see the lowered level of the remaining water.

  

  

  

  The day after we visited the area, a fire broke out upstream from the lake -- there is a small road that goes upriver to some lovely campgrounds, a National Forest Ranger Station, and a Juvenile Boys (prison) Camp.  It hasn't been definitively announced yet, but it was speculated that high winds blew down an oak tree near one of the campgrounds, downing a power line next to the river to spark the Rey Fire. In the last week, the fire has burned no structures, but has burned nearly 40,000 acres into the wilderness area on the opposite side of the river.  This is actually good for the area -- it is regenerative to rid the area of the old growth and allow new growth to flourish.  There is major concern, however, about the health of the lake when the fire has burned itself out.  When (or maybe I should say 'if') it ever rains, there will be large amounts of ash and silt washing into the lake, reducing its capacity to hold water, and perhaps polluting the water that does get to the lake.  There are two smaller dams upstream.  One is so small and so silted that it holds virtually no water.  The other is a supplemental source of water for the city.  That reservoir is no longer being used for drinking water -- the water is no longer pure and the lake is more like a mud puddle.  They are, however using it to fill the helicopter buckets transporting water to be dropped on the fire!  Hopefully it will soak in and mitigate some of the  runoff from the next rains!  The ground level firefighting efforts have been very creative, too -- in addition to helicopters dropping lots of water and two DC-10's dropping fire retardant phos-chec (the red stuff you may have seen in news photos), the firefighters have been wrapping outpost hiking cabins in what looks like tinfoil to protect them -- if the flames can't reach the wood, the cabins don't burn.  This has been done several times in previous fires with great success, and several buildings of historic significance have been saved this way.

  Traditionally the fire season in this area begins in July and lasts until it rains in October or November or later.  Some of the worst fires in the area have occurred in late November  through January.  There have been several big fires in the last few years, but there is a lot of land that has not burned for 100 or more years (they say the Rey fire is in areas that have not burned at least since 1940 or earlier!).  This year's season will continue as it is, with fires breaking out on a daily basis -- we can only hope that they are in remote areas or put out quickly.  Meantime, the air in Southern California is smoky and brown and not very healthful!

  • 4:59 pm
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