KLAMATH FALLS, Oregon — As the Klamath Basin’s water crisis continues to fester without a long-term solution, irrigators tend to harken back to the days before the 2001 water shutoff, when irrigation seasons were more or less normal and Basin farming wasn’t punctuated with a question mark.
KLAMATH FALLS, Oregon — While the Klamath Basin’s snowpack is at 85% of what it would be normally this time of year, there’s already more water stored in the mountains than last year. So why are Basin hydrologists projecting another exceptionally dry summer for Upper Klamath Lake? The answer…
Washington, D.C. – A few weeks ago, I released a comprehensive concept to resolve the salmon, energy and dam issues that have created tension in the Northwest for decades. It is meant to provide security for all stakeholders, end lawsuits and give Idaho’s wild salmon and steelhead a chance f…
A quarter of the Legislature, including more than half the members from north central Idaho, co-sponsored a resolution opposing removal of the Snake-Columbia River dams.
The Idaho Water Resource Board will study three options for creating a large-scale managed aquifer recharge site in the Upper Snake River Valley.
Washington, D.C. – “Last week, I released for discussion a concept that could end the Northwest salmon wars. It would lock in a more certain future for agriculture, energy, transportation and communities and also give Idaho’s wild salmon and steelhead their best chance for survival.
Idaho Farm Bureau Federation, the state’s largest farm organization, is strongly opposed to a proposal that would result in the removal of four lower Snake River dams that provide amazing benefits to Idaho and the entire Pacific Northwest region.
TWIN FALLS — Idaho is having a drier-than-normal winter, which could cause significant drought conditions in the Magic Valley this summer.
Rep. Mike Simpson has shown Idaho and the Northwest what bold leadership looks like with his proposal to rebuild our northwest infrastructure and save Idaho’s salmon and steelhead from extinction.
A St. Anthony farmer who has held several top leadership positions within the potato industry has been elected chairman of the Idaho Water Resource Board.
BOISE — The Idaho Water Resource Board reviewed the critical actions needed to move forward with a 6-foot raise of Anderson Ranch Dam in its January meeting, and in one of the necessary steps, it hired a financial consultant to help with financing the non-federal portion of the $83 million p…
As we head into the Christmas holiday season and the watch 2020 come to a close, I must admit that I’m feeling a bit of sadness – and a little bit of joy – contemplating the departure of two very valuable long-time members of the Idaho Water Resource Board – Vince Alberdi of Kimberly and Joh…
A new study shows that it is possible to increase storage and lake levels in Bear Lake.
BISMARCK, N.D. (AP) — The Army Corps of Engineers reversed course on an Obama-era proposal to charge for water drawn from reservoirs the Corps manages, North Dakota’s attorney general said Friday.
BISMARCK, N.D. (AP) — The Army Corps of Engineers reversed course on an Obama-era proposal to charge for water drawn from reservoirs the Corps manages, North Dakota’s attorney general said Friday.
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LEWISTON, Idaho (AP) — A controversial new study challenges long-standing science that pins salmon declines in the Snake River Basin on dams.
BOISE — The Idaho Water Resource Board has agreed not to divert 200 cubic feet per second of streamflow under its recharge water rights from Dec. 1 through Feb. 15, allowing that amount of water to remain the Snake River for other uses, including hydropower production, below Milner Dam in th…
SODA SPRINGS — The State of Idaho filed a petition on Nov. 20 requesting the 5th District Court to commence the Bear River Basin Adjudication, a legal process in which a court reviews and confirms all existing water rights in the Bear River Basin, the Malad River Valley and the Curlew Valley.
BOISE — A district judge has ruled the Idaho Department of Water Resources can forge ahead with creating a large groundwater management area to prevent water users from mining the Eastern Snake Plain Aquifer.
SEATTLE (AP) — A major storm carrying high winds, drenching rain and heavy snow is headed for the Pacific Northwest, according to weather experts.
A slow-moving crisis threatens the U.S. Central Plains, which grow a quarter of the nation’s crops. Underground, the region’s lifeblood – water – is disappearing, placing one of the world’s major food-producing regions at risk.
PORTLAND, Ore. — A coalition of environmental and fishing groups are suing a water district in southern Oregon over an aging, privately owned dam that they say hinders the passage of struggling salmon populations in the pristine North Umpqua River.
An Idaho State University research team has received a $1.3 million grant to study how streams that typically go dry for much of the year affect downstream water quality.
An association of nine Eastern Idaho canal companies should benefit greatly during the upcoming irrigation season from excess surface water shareholders stored in the aquifer during the past water year.
BOISE — Idaho Rural Water Association (IRWA) earns the 2020 State Association of the Year Award in the Awards of Excellence competition awarded by National Rural Water Association (NRWA). This is the second time IRWA has earned this award since its incorporation in Idaho in 1987.
Coming off a strong water year, Aberdeen-Springfield Canal Co. General Manager Steve Howser is encouraged by weather models showing the region is likely in store for another wet winter.
SALEM, Ore. (AP) — A new management plan that will guide future decisions and address urgent issues like climate change has been approved for the Columbia River Gorge National Scenic Area.
BOISE — A meager return of sockeye salmon to central Idaho this year despite high hopes and a new fish hatchery intended to help save the species from extinction has fisheries managers trying to figure out what went wrong.
Other effects are harder to measure, but can be just as harmful. One example is agricultural nitrogen runoff from farmlands in the Mississippi River Basin. It mainly comes from fertilizer that farmers apply to millions of acres of crops.
The Nampa & Meridian Irrigation District’s Precinct 1 director is up for re-election Nov. 3, and candidates and polling places have been announced.
KLAMATH FALLS, Oregon — President Donald Trump issued an executive order Tuesday afternoon to formally establish a dedicated committee to address federal water-related issues.
The Mink Creek watershed supports a wide variety of recreation uses with many quality trails and camping spots close to home in Pocatello.
SPOKANE, Wash. — Environmental groups are vowing to continue their fight to remove four dams on the Snake River in Washington state they say are killing salmon that are a key food source for endangered killer whales.
ABERDEEN — For several decades, flowering rush remained a problem with no clear solution for the managers of the Aberdeen-Springfield Canal Co.
SPOKANE, Wash. — The U.S. government announced Friday that four huge dams on the Snake River in Washington state will not be removed to help endangered salmon migrate to the ocean.
BOISE — Recent water level monitoring data shows the volume of water stored in the Eastern Snake Plain Aquifer has increased by about 350,000 acre-feet in the past year and 2.2 million acre-feet in the past five years, officials told the Idaho Water Resource Board Thursday.
Today, state agencies are asking Utahns to reduce water use during the heatwave as the drought’s hold on the state tightens. Researchers at Utah State University have similarly been studying how much of a water reduction crops can handle before impacting yield.
August is the month for two garden W’s: weeding and watering. Regular attention to both keeps a vegetable or flower garden pretty and productive well into autumn.
PORTLAND, Ore. (AP) — Federal regulators on Thursday threw a significant curveball at a coalition that has been planning for years to demolish four massive hydroelectric dams on a river along the Oregon-California border to save salmon populations that have dwindled to almost nothing.
MIDLAND, Washington — This summer, anyone driving through Klamath Project land will likely pass by many empty fields, left fallow after farms received only 40 percent of their required water allocation this year.
BOISE — The Idaho State Department of Agriculture is seeking public comment from the agriculture community on its proposed changes to rules around pesticide and chemigation use and application.
One of the Treasure Valley’s key leaders in the area of irrigation water system management is leaving his post.
Friends of the Teton River faced a challenge: how to celebrate the farmers and ranchers who have partnered with the nonprofit to enhance soil and water health, and how to best educate the public on what’s happening behind the scenes in the Farms and Fish Initiative.
A Pocatello attorney recently prevailed in a monumental, decades-long water rights battle, stopping a planned 300-mile groundwater pipeline to Las Vegas that threatened a Native American holy site.
LEWISTON, Idaho (AP) — An Environmental Protection Agency report provides details about how federal government dams in the Snake and Columbia river system raise summer water temperatures, hurting endangered salmon runs.
The Idaho Water Resource Board recharged approximately 447,950 acre-feet of water into the Eastern Snake Plain Aquifer in the winter of 2019-20, according to a staff report presented on Tuesday.
LONGVIEW, Wash. (AP) — The Washington state Department of Ecology in an historic move has required federal operators of eight dams on in the Columbia-Snake rivers to create a plan to keep the waters cold enough for adult salmon survival.
KENSINGTON, Maryland — A two-decade-long dry spell that has parched much of the western United States is turning into one of the deepest megadroughts in the region in more than 1,200 years, a new study found.
All of Idaho had received below-normal precipitation for the water year through April 1, with the Wood and Lost River basins experiencing the most notable shortfalls, according to a recently released water supply outlook report.
SPOKANE, Wash. — Some environmental groups are complaining about the teleconference format for gathering public comments on a federal government proposal to save salmon runs on the Columbia River system.
KLAMATH, Calif. — The second-largest river in California has sustained Native American tribes with plentiful salmon for millennia, provided upstream farmers with irrigation water for generations and served as a haven for retirees who built dream homes along its banks.
The 500 miles of canals in the Nampa & Meridian Irrigation District received water on Wednesday, the start of the 2020 irrigation season.
SPOKANE, Wash. (AP) — People in Washington state remain sharply divided on whether four federal hydroelectric dams along the Snake River should be removed to help endangered salmon and orca recover, a state report concluded.
Following a dry February, most of Idaho still had a better-than-average snowpack to start March, and water managers stepped up releases from the Eastern Snake Plain reservoir system.
PORTLAND, Ore. (AP) — A long-awaited federal report out recently rejected the idea of removing four hydroelectric dams on a major Pacific Northwest river in a last-ditch effort to save more than a dozen species of threatened or endangered salmon, saying such a dramatic approach would destabi…
