This in-depth examination of water law and management in Oregon provides a compelling perspective on a major environmental issues in the American West--the region's diminishing water supply. Bastasch offers thorough yet accessible explanations of a variety of water issues and controversies, bringing focus and clarity to a murky, complex subject. From Oregonians seeking interesting facts about their state's water riches to water specialists and users in need of a handy reference to Oregon's water law, the handbook offers a key to understanding how we use this precious and scarce resource.
A lively primer on the region's most precious and scarce resource, drawn from the pages of the newspaper that sets the standard for coverage of environmental issues in the West.
Speaking for the River is the first book-length study of Willamette River clean-up efforts from the 1920s through the 1970s. These efforts centered on a struggle between abatement advocates and the two primary polluters in the watershed, the City of Portland and the pulp and paper industry.
In December 1958, Ken Martin, his wife Barbara, and their three young daughters left their home in Northeast Portland to search for Christmas greens in the Columbia River Gorge—and never returned. The Martins' disappearance spurred the largest missing persons search in Oregon history and the mystery has remained perplexingly unsolved to this day. For the past six years, JB Fisher (Portland on the Take) has pored over the case after finding in his garage a stack of old Oregon Journal newspaper articles about the story. Through a series of serendipitous encounters, Fisher obtained a wealth of first-hand and never-before publicized information about the case including police reports from several agencies, materials and photos belonging to the Martin family, and the personal notebooks and papers of Multnomah County Sheriff's Detective Walter E. Graven, who was always convinced the case was a homicide and worked tirelessly to prove it. Graven, however, faced real resistance from his superiors to bring his findings to light. Used as a trail left behind after his 1988 death to guide future researchers, Graven's personal documents provide fascinating insight into the question of what happened to the Martins—a path leading to abduction and murder, an intimate family secret, and civic corruption going all the way to the Kennedys in Washington, DC.
This is not your mother’s memoir. In The Chronology of Water, Lidia Yuknavitch, a lifelong swimmer and Olympic hopeful escapes her raging father and alcoholic and suicidal mother when she accepts a swimming scholarship which drug and alcohol addiction eventually cause her to lose. What follows is promiscuous sex with both men and women, some of them famous, and some of it S&M, and Lidia discovers the power of her sexuality to help her forget her pain. The forgetting doesn’t last, though, and it is her hard-earned career as a writer and a teacher, and the love of her husband and son, that ultimately create the life she needs to survive.
Rivers of Oregon captures the beauty and the intrinsic qualities of the state's irresistible riverscapes like no other book has done. From the underwater view and from the refuge of riparian forests, from the seat of a canoe or raft and from distant mountain summits, readers will gain new perspectives on the extraordinary features that provide us with water, with life, and with scenes whose loss would leave us deeply impoverished.
IRRIGATION FUNDAMENTALS is a comprehensive text on the basic principles and practices of applied agricultural irrigation. Written over a period of more than 10 years, it is based on the authors'' extensive experience in farming, consulting, research, teaching, and other related agricultural activities. The book is for use by teachers of introductory courses in irrigation, farmers who have some basic technical knowledge, and for administrators who need a general understanding of irrigation as an aid for policy decisions in water resource development and planning. Various factors that influence crop yield and production including climate, fertility, water, drainage, and agronomic practices are addressed. The various irrigation methods such as border, basin, contour, furrow, sub, sprinkle, and drip or trickle are described; and conditions are given for selection of the appropriate method to use. Recent developments and new technology are included herein when they have obvious practical applications, but for the most part the material presented in this book is based on well established principles and practices. Much of the content is very practical and much is essentially nontechnical. Nevertheless, some of the material covered in this book goes beyond the basic concepts in an attempt to better describe the relationships and techniques employed by irrigation scientists and irrigation engineers.From the Preface: The future of the world depends very much on how we manage natural resources. Since the year 1900 there has been a ninefold increase in global carbon emissions from burning fossil fuels, and the world population has increased about 3.7 times in this century. Vast areas of forests have been destroyed, and irrigated lands now produce 40% of the food supply. Due to depletion of groundwater reserves and an increase in population, irrigated area per capita is declining. Consequently, the irrigation of additional alluvial lands is a strategic necessity for all of humankind. Much of the alluvial lands cannot be made productive without prior development of water resources through flood control, drainage, and irrigation. The production of electricity through hydropower and the production of alcohol fuel from irrigated crops, as has been practiced for many years in Brazil, can slow the increase in carbon emissions. Such diverse developments are typically not separable; rather, they must be considered as integral parts of a comprehensive development plan. The conservation of natural resources and increasing productivity of irrigated lands are also strategic necessities. Much of the current technology is highly transferable and crop yields can be significantly increased on lands already under irrigation.The authors have worked in many countries in connection with resource inventories, teaching, and the planning, development and use of irrigation as a tool for increasing production and providing employment. They have written extensively and have been honored for their achievements. They have considerable experience with everything from primitive low-technology irrigation developments to highly developed irrigation in the USA and in dozens of countries around the world. Both of the authors have dedicated their careers to teaching, research, and consulting in agricultural irrigation and water resources development and planning. It is their hope and expectation that this book will provide incentives for investigating and documenting land and water resources, improving development, increasing crop yields, conserving resources, and improving the environment. From the Table of Contents:Chapt. 1 - INTRODUCTION: Irrigation Fundamentals: - - A Definition of Irrigation - - Statistical Perspectives of Agricultural IrrigationChapt. 2 - FACTORS INFLUENCING CROP PRODUCTION: - - Introduction - - Temperature, Radiation, and Evaporative Potential - - Climate Change - - Soil Fertility and Fertilizers - - Water Availability and Distribution - - Soil Aeration and Drainage - - Plant Density, Spacing and Leaf Area Index - - Crop VarietyChapt. 3 - AGRICULTURAL SOILS: - - Introduction - - Soil Texture and Structure - - Soil Classification and Evaluation - - Bureau of Reclamation Land Classification - - Soil Age and Topography - - Soil Chemistry - - Infiltration Rates - - Soil-Water Relationships - - Equations for Soil Water Content - - Soil Water Potential - - Measuring Soil Water ContentChapt. 4 - EVALUATING IRRIGATION RESOURCES: - - Introduction - - Climate - - Hydrology - - Human and Other Factors - - Integrated DevelopmentChapt. 5 - IRRIGATION METHODS: - - Introduction - - Graded Border Irrigation - - Basin Irrigation - - Contour Levees - - Furrow Irrigation - - Sub-Irrigation - - Sprinkle Irrigation - - Drip or Trickle Irrigation - - Selecting an Irrigation Method - - Land Grading and Leveling - - Laser-Leveling Equipment and Practices - - Computing Diagonal Slopes - - Irrigation System EvaluationChapt. 6 - CROP WATER REQUIREMENTS: - - Introduction - - Direct Methods - - Indirect Methods - - Potential Evaporation - - Reference Evapotranspiration - - Extraterrestrial Solar Radiation - - Irrigation Requirements - - Crop CoefficientsChapt. 7 - IRRIGATION SCHEDULING: - - Introduction - - Allowable Water Depletion - - Monitoring Soil Water - - Scheduling Irrigations - - Rice Irrigation
