Wildfire Watch/ Drought Watch

hedonist said:

Happy (belated?) birthday!

My co-worker/buddy did a 35-mile two day hike on Mt. Baldy this weekend. In the rain! Definitely could use it - we got some down here Saturday evening and Sunday morning - but damn, the damage it did up there.

(mañana , thanks :-) )

That's dedication to hiking!

Almost said, "Good to hear you're getting a little precip. as well" but when it causes havoc, maybe not such good timing. Erosion, I'm guessing?

A friend of mine sent me this article- no link so here it is:

There's another side effect of the drought in California that many people
haven't yet considered: Removing all that ground water is causing
*earthquakes* as the ground caves in due to unprecedented water extraction:


Originally published August 18 2014 How California's extreme drought will
lead to a wave of earthquakesby Ethan A. Huff, staff writer

(NaturalNews) With about 60 percent of the state now limping through the
worst categorical level of drought on record, California faces an
unprecedented water crisis that, besides triggering shortages, stands to
greatly influence the availability of fresh produce nationwide. And as far
as its own residents and the residents of nearby states are concerned,
there is an additional threat also waiting in the wings: the increased
likelihood of earthquakes.

A new study published in the journal *Nature* raises some serious questions
about the stability of California now that underground aquifers are
plunging to record lows. All throughout the Central Valley, which grows
most of the nation's lettuce, almonds and other produce, more water is
being pumped out of the ground than is being put back in, a phenomenon that
researchers say is causing the ground to shift.

According to a team of geologists led by Colin B. Amos from Western
Washington University, the subterranean landscape beneath the earth, also
known as the lithosphere, is literally separating from the land on top
throughout California. The California Coast Ranges, the Tehachapi
Mountains, and the southern Sierra Nevada, says *TakePart*'s Chris Clarke,
are rising by as much as three millimeters per year, or roughly an inch
every 10 years.

A series of 500 GPS recorders carefully placed throughout the Central
Valley and its surrounding mountains revealed that the water table
throughout the area is rapidly dwindling. This means that the 176
billion-ton water load that
normally holds down the lithosphere is becoming increasingly lighter,
resulting in a land separation that, historically speaking, has made the
ground more prone to seismic activity.

"Groundwater pumping unburdens the lithosphere," said William Hammond, a
geologist at the University of Nevada and co-author of the study, as quoted
by *TakePart*. "When you pump that much groundwater, the load gets taken
away and the landscape essentially bounces up. The Sierra Nevada is rising
more quickly as a result of groundwater pumping in the Great Valley."

2011 earthquake in Spain caused by water overdrafts, say scientists Back in
2011, a 5.2-magnitude earthquake that rocked Lorca, Spain, killing 10
people and causing extensive infrastructure damage, was found to have been
caused by the overdraft of water from local aquifers. A cohort of
researchers determined that, based on the fault slip pattern and movement
of land at the surface, changes in aquifer volumes were the most likely
cause of the quake.

"The area of fault slip correlates well with the pattern of positive
Coulomb stress change that we calculate to result from the extraction of
groundwater in a nearby basin aquifer," wrote the authors of a study
published in the journal *Nature Geoscience*. "Our results imply that
anthropogenic activities could influence how and when earthquakes
occur."

In the Central Valley, a similar phenomenon has been documented in relation
to when the most water is drawn from underground aquifers to nourish crops.
In the late summer and early fall, according to geologists, the Parkfield
section of the infamous San Andreas Fault system typically experiences
increased seismic activity exceeding 1.25 magnitude or higher, which is
also the time when the most water is drawn.

"That seasonal change means loading and unloading on the lithosphere,"
added Hammond. "The earth flexes up and down, and small earthquakes seem to
respond to that."

*Sources for this article include:*

http://www.takepart.com



http://www.nature.com


http://www.bbc.com

http://science.naturalnews.com

Not to diminish the importance of honey bees to our current means of existence, but I think it is worth noting that honey bees are not native to north America and that indigenous people got along just fine without them.

unsung said:

So do we dump the bucket on our head or no?

Sure! Make a bucket full of origami cubes out of recycled white paper to dump on our heads!

hedonist said:

I dig Vince.

And I do hope all have donated - it seems so, or at least a huge influx has poured in from most.

It's heartening, and shows how much is available to give. Shit, just look at those kickstarter things.

Yes, giving a what we can to help fight this and other diseases is important.

It would also be encouraging to see more effort put into preventing disease- cancers caused by all the chemicals we dump into our bodies and our environment, diseases take hold due to stress, etc.