Blog Post: January 12, 2022
Last year, the Sacramento River’s winter-run Chinook salmon were almost entirely killed off. How? California’s State Water Resources Control Board allowed water releases into the river that were too hot.
The salmon need the cold water stored behind Shasta Dam to survive. But the Newsom...
BK In The News: September 2, 2021
ANTIOCH, Calif. (CN) — Founded on a lush plain of the largest estuary on the West Coast of North America shortly after gold was discovered, Antioch’s fortunes have always risen and fallen with the delta tides.
One of California’s oldest settlements, what started as a ranch town morphed decades ago...
BK In The News: August 13, 2021
If you’ve eaten sushi anywhere in the U.S., chances are the rice came from California’s Sacramento Valley. Fritz Durst, a sixth-generation farmer, has grown the grain and other crops there for more than four decades. But this year, amid a historic drought, Durst is planting only half as many acres...
Blog Post: July 21, 2021
Toxic algal blooms—which can make people sick and kill pets—are spreading fast in the Delta. Our patrol drone, Osprey, recently captured the footage above of the Stockton Marina (above), where plumes of sickly green algae have fanned out along the waterfront.
These poisonous microorganisms are...
BK In The News: July 12, 2021
In California, it’s not unusual for wildlife officials to truck salmon between their native river habitat and the Pacific Ocean. That’s especially true during droughts, when the Sacramento River runs too low and too warm for the young fish to survive.
But a long-stalled plan to save Sacramento...
Blog Post: July 7, 2021
In this documentary, actor Adrian Grenier and National Geographic Explorer Shannon Switzer Swanson explore the growing problem of water scarcity in the US—including right here in the Bay Area.
In this segment, Baykeeper scientist Dr. Jon Rosenfield explains how depleted freshwater flows are...
BK In The News: June 18, 2021
Occasionally, you come across an article, a book, or a film with exceptional power to capture your imagination, influencing your ideas or life, or, at least, reminding you of a time when you, too, were obsessed by similar concerns and hopes.
This happened to me recently by a film with the magic and...
BK In The News: June 17, 2021
As drought parches California, obliterates its snowpack, and reduces rivers to trickles, a familiar feud over water has resurfaced. Farmers want more of it to irrigate their crops, while fishermen and environmentalists want more left in rivers to protect the state’s Chinook salmon.
Mainstream news...
BK In The News: June 14, 2021
The California water board has approved a plan for water releases into the Sacramento River that could kill off an entire run of endangered chinook salmon and put at risk another population that is part of the commercial salmon fishery.
The State Water Resources Control Board has informed the...
Blog Post: June 4, 2021
California is facing a punishing drought… again. Our rivers are running low and can’t support fish and wildlife, and people across the state will have to scramble to cut back on water use. But some urban water utilities—notably the Bay Area’s powerful San Francisco Public Utilities Commission (...