Issue link: http://winesandvines.uberflip.com/i/528936
July 2015 WINES&VINES 31 GROUNDED GRAPEGROWING See more nets in our 2010 catalog online @ www.spectrellising.com 800-237-4594 Quality Counts When The grower-friendly SideneT PermaNet • Reduced installation costs – leave permanently attached to wire • Reinforced edges with eyelets for easier installation • Long lasting (10-year UV warranty): reduces replacement net costs • Small mesh size offers sunburn protection while allowing airflow • 100% lockstitch design eliminates tears, thread separation, bird damage • Extra heavy yarn construction for extreme durability PermaNet Gives You All These Benefits: Introducing THE BEST OF AMERICAN OAK www.finenorthernoak.com • 707-307-6222 • info@finenorthernoak.com On a larger scale, groundwater banking is a way of storing water in the ground during periods of excess for use during droughts. Some urban water purveyors already use the practice. Research is under way by University of California scientists in which farmland is flooded in the winter during periods of high flow from adjacent rivers. For this to work, there has to be a void in the groundwater stor- age (over-drafted aquifer); crop land that water can infiltrate easily and conditions under which contamination of the aquifer from leached fertilizer or pesticides is unlikely to happen. Alfalfa fields are an example of good potential recharge areas. It is widely planted around our state (more than 1 million acres) on mostly well-drained soils. Two sites are being studied: Scott Valley Irrigation District (near Mt. Shasta) and the Orland-Artois Water District near Chico. Water is being applied to large areas from rivers during high flows, and changes in water levels are being measured to see if depleted groundwater levels can be re- charged. The project has just begun but shows promise for a way of improving groundwater storage and addressing the loss of snow pack as a water storage option. Conclusion As California works through climate change and drought, all of its citizens will be obliged to rethink how water is used. Conservation will be the obvious first step in dealing with this huge problem. Water reuse is another area that is feasible but will take some time to imple- ment. Groundwater recharging may turn out to be easier and more cost effective than new reservoirs, but it will take certain conditions and new permitting by the State Water Re- sources Control Board to become a common practice. Winegrowers are already actively engaged in using this precious and essential resource wisely, and they will doubtlessly find new ways to improve on their present irrigation practices. Glenn McGourty is the University of California Coopera- tive Extension winegrowing and plant science advisor for Lake and Mendocino counties. He tends a 1-acre vineyard of the aromatic Italian wine grape variety Arneis on his property along the Russian River near Ukiah, Calif. Growers in parts of California's Central Valley are pumping nearly 2,000 feet below the surface in some places, using water that found its way there thousands of years ago.