KQED has posted on their website an excellent primer on how water and power use in California are connected. Engaging cartoons convey how Water Needs Power, and how producing Power Needs Water. These short cartoons are the most effective communication tools I’ve ever seen on this subject.

For those who like to consume their information on California water in a more-voluminous, less-artistic, more-policy-oriented way, in December the Pacific Institute released its California Water Footprint report. Full of graphs and detailed information about water use, in this report you can learn things such as: meat and dairy products account for 47% of California’s water footprint, or 93% of California’s water (that is used to produce goods and services) is used to produce agricultural goods and services.

It’s official! Peak 12,240 on the border between Yosemite National Park and the Inyo National Forest is now named Mt. Andrea Lawrence, thanks to legislation signed into law last week by President Obama.

The newly named Mt. Andrea Lawrence, center, on the boundary of Yosemite National Park, January 2013. Photo by Geoffrey McQuilkin.

The prominent but previously unnamed peak, which has been visited by several Mono Lake Committee staff members since the naming effort began, has sweeping views across Yosemite, the upper San Joaquin River drainage, and the Rush Creek–Mono (more…)

Number 2 on our Top Ten highlights list is the intensive process of planning for a 21st century aqueduct that can deliver restoration flows to Mono Lake’s tributaries at the times they need it the most, deliver water to Mono Lake so it can rise to the management level of 6392 feet above sea level, as well as efficiently export water to Los Angeles.

An aerial view of Rush Creek, the Rush Creek return ditch, and Grant Lake Reservoir, which are key to the 21st century aqueduct discussions. Photo by Geoffrey McQuilkin.

If you’ve been following the Mono Lake Newsletter, you’ll know that the Committee has been working intensively on this process for nearly two years. (more…)

Number 3 on our Top Ten highlights list is the solution that is keeping Mono Lake’s state park open and operating.

Mono Lake Tufa State Natural Reserve Interpretive Specialist Dave Marquart at Old Marina explaining how the new parking fee keeps the park open. Photo by Arya Degenhardt.

A little more than a year ago, we found out that the Mono Lake Tufa State Natural Reserve had been removed from the state’s closure list. The next day we began working on a plan for keeping the park open—the solution is a modest parking fee at Old Marina of only $3.00 per vehicle. An “iron ranger” for collecting fees was installed in May, and visitors to Old Marina have been dropping their fee envelopes in ever since!

Number 9 on our Top Ten highlight list is the outpouring of feedback about Caltrans’ Lee Vining Rockfall Safety Project, the most recent Caltrans project proposed for the Mono Basin.

One of the Rockfall Project slopes, in a view from Old Marina. Photo by Geoff McQuilkin.

This project will address six roadcuts on the west side of Highway 395 near Old Marina, increasing safety by preventing rocks from falling onto the road. When we put out a call for comment letters to Mono Lake Committee members about Caltrans’ draft initial study document, you responded in force (more…)

The Mono Lake Committee’s 2012 Annual Report is hot off the press and available to view online!

Read about the 2011 projects and activities in our focus areas of protection, stream restoration, education, and scientific research. View the Committee’s financial  (more…)

On Saturday morning, October 13, a small plane flew over Mono Lake. It banked multiple times, and then flew across the lake over and over. A sightseer? No, this was scientific research in action—the annual Eared Grebe aerial photo survey!

A view over Mono Lake's eastern shore, looking southwest over the Mono Craters to the Sierra Nevada range. Photo by Arya Degenhardt with aerial support provided by LightHawk.

A bit of background: Eared Grebes nest in the northern Rockies and southern Canada, and visit Mono Lake mid-migration. While here in the fall, they undergo molt and gorge themselves on (more…)

Visitors to the Mono Basin and Long Valley area in the next two weeks can expect to see golden aspen trees, snow dusted peaks, and something quite unusual—a lone helicopter flying only 500 feet from the ground.

An example of Mono Basin volcanism: Negit Island, a lava dome on Mono Lake. Photo by Rose Catron.

The helicopter marks an exciting new development in an ongoing project by the US Geological Survey (USGS) to monitor volcanic activity in the Eastern Sierra. (more…)

The October 1, 2011 to September 30, 2012 water year recently came to a close. Happy new 2013 water year!

What is a water year?
It is said that hydrologists get to celebrate a new year at least four times a year—January 1st for a calendar year, April 1st for a runoff year, July 1st for a coastal California rainfall year (as well as a fiscal year), and October 1st for a water year. Needless to say, this creates challenges in organizing hydrology data.

Here in the Mono Basin, we typically use the runoff year to summarize most measurements involving stream flows, since (more…)

Thanks to recent efforts of California Trout, a video of part one of Elden Vestal’s November 3, 1993 deposition is now on YouTube. You can watch the hour and forty-seven minute video here on the Mono Basin Clearinghouse.

Watch the YouTube Video of Elden's 1993 historical testimony here!

Elden was a California Department of Fish & Game Fisheries Biologist whose deposition was instrumental (more…)