Free Republic

The question is: what's wrong with this picture? Think for a moment and then click the link below. Aral Sea in the 21st century Full size

Ancient Chinese irrigation system stands test of time -- and quake by Ian Timberlake Thu May 22, 11:55 PM ET DUJIANGYAN, China (AFP) - High above the world's oldest operating irrigation system, Zhang Shuanggun, a local villager, stands on an observation platform cracked by China's massive earthquake last week. She has a simple answer for why the ancient, bamboo-based Dujiangyan irrigation system sustained only minor damage, while nearby modern dams and their vast amounts of concrete are now under 24-hour watch for signs of collapse. "This ancient project is perfection," Zhang said. From the hillside platform, the workings of the...

Electricity, diesel, fertilizer prices tough on farmers, ranchers LUBBOCK, Texas (AP)--South Plains cotton producer Don Langston is eager for a "big rain." Without it he'll have to keep irrigation pumps running to water thousands of acres of dusty, parched land so there's enough moisture to plant this year's crop in a couple of months. He figures he'll spend as much as $50 more an acre than he did last year, when rainfall was plentiful, even by West Texas standards. "We're going to have to have a good crop just to break even," Langston said. "I'm OK. Just need a big...

Discovery of vast prehistoric works built by Giants?The Geoglyphs of Teohuanaco Posted: February 24, 2008 1:00 am EasternBy David E. Flynn© 2008 RaidersNewsNetwork The size and scope of David Flynn's Teohuanaco discovery simply surpasses comprehension. Mammoth traces of intelligence carved in stone and covering hundreds of square miles. For those who understand what they are seeing here for the first time, this could indeed be the strongest evidence ever found of prehistoric engineering by those who were known and feared throughout the ancient world as gods. ~ Thomas Horn This satellite image (above) is a portion of the Andean foothills...

Until the middle of the 1900s, much of our country’s food and fiber was produced east of the Mississippi River. Maine led the nation in potato production in 1940, and New York wasn’t far behind. The South, including Alabama, Georgia and Mississippi, dominated cotton. Large amounts of corn were grown in almost every state for consumption by the local livestock and poultry. Regional vegetable markets, especially in the mid-Atlantic states, served the population centers of the East. By 1980, Western irrigation and improvements in transportation had largely destroyed this Eastern system of agriculture. Irrigated cotton in Arizona, California and Texas...

LSA ADDER — The U.S. military continued progress in a program to provide generators at pump stations along the Euphrates River to irrigate water to local farmlands in southern Iraq Tuesday. The 134th Brigade Support Battalion along with local contractors dredged existing irrigation canals to local farms up to 15 kilometers away from the Euphrates River. The generators will greatly improve agriculture in the area, said Sheikh Mohammed Tayeh, a representative of the council of Batha, Iraq. “It was really barren,” said U.S. Army Sgt. Todd M. Engebreston , a vehicle commander of the134th BSB. “When we first got here,...

AUSTRALIA may be forced to import basic foods if rains don't come soon, Prime Minister John Howard has warned. Mr Howard announced yesterday that farmers would not be able to irrigate with water from the Murray-Darling river system if there was no rain in the next six to eight weeks. Today he said he feared food prices would rise if the irrigation taps were turned off and farmers' crops started to fail. "We could see increases and I worry there will be increases," Mr Howard told reporters. "Obviously it might be possible in some areas to import the foodstuffs that...

MOSCOW, Nov. 25 — The Qaeda military base called Zhawar Kili Al- Badr also has a nickname: Wolf's Hole. Zhawar worms its way deep inside the walls of a gorge in the Sodyaki Ghar mountains of eastern Afghanistan, a half-mile lattice of caves and connecting tunnels barely 4,000 yards from the Pakistan border. The Soviet Army took it in 1986 during the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan, but only after 57 days of aerial bombardment and hand-to-hand combat. "It was seized, blown up. Everything was blown up," Maj. Gen. Aleksandr Lyakhovsky, an Afghanistan veteran now retired from Russian military service, said ...

LITTLE ROCK, Ark. - A federal judge halted a $320 million irrigation project Thursday for fear it could disturb the habitat of a woodpecker that may or may not be extinct. The dispute involves the ivory-billed woodpecker. The last confirmed sighting of the bird in North America was in 1944, and scientists had thought the species was extinct until 2004, when a kayaker claimed to have spotted one in the area. But scientists have been unable to confirm the sighting. Still, U.S. District Judge William R. Wilson said that for purposes of the lawsuit brought by environmental groups, he had...

Part of the problem is that the people who decide national policy are headquartered in Washington, D.C., where large plots of private property are rare. Those of us who live in urban or suburban areas imagine endangered species protection to be as simple as being kind to blue whales, grizzly bears and bald eagles. We don’t stop to consider the dilemmas facing people thousands of miles away from us. Bill Snape, Chairman of the Endangered Species Coalition, is an example of one who lives in either ignorance or denial. “There just aren’t private landowners that I can identify where the...

Tempting fate: A torrent of doubtsProject backers expect electricity, water and flood protection, but critics call it pie-in-the-skyBy Matt Weiser -- Bee Staff Writer Published 2:15 am PST Sunday, February 19, 2006 American taxpayers have had an unsteady relationship with the Auburn dam: $400 million spent so far on a dam that was never built; another $30 million through the end of this year to restore the former construction site; and now $1 million more to study whether to build the dam after all. Since Hurricane Katrina swamped New Orleans, Auburn dam supporters have rallied behind the project anew, suggesting...

U.S. Army Lt. Col. John Cross, battalion commander of 1st Special Troops Battalion, meets with local leaders from the village of Muzerfa, Iraq, Jan. 26, 2006, to dedicate a new water pump that provides water from the Tigris River for the village and irrigates the nearby farm fields. U.S. Army photo by Sgt. James Real Iraqi Villagers Dedicate New Irrigation Pump Following the dedication, U.S. soldiers and the villagers enjoyed a banquet and discussed issues. By 1st Brigade Combat Team 4th Infantry Division TAJI, Iraq, Jan. 27, 2006 —The village of Muzerfa dedicated a new irrigation pump Jan. 19,...

I am very close to finishing my book regarding The Stand at Klamath Falls and the crisis of 2001. Here is the cover art: (Note: In this post I am including the Introduction, the Acknowledgements, and the Epilogue for review and comment.. The book should be completed and to the printers by the 1st of February.) INTRODUCTION It has been almost five years since the memorable and pivotal events surrounding the struggle by farmers in the Klamath Basin of Oregon and California took place. Much has occurred since then that has overshadowed those events…but nothing can erase the importance of...

BANGKOK, Thailand, September 6, 2005 (ENS) - The mountains of Asia, including the towering Himalayas, are facing accelerating threats from a rapid rise in roads, settlements, overgrazing and deforestation, experts are warning in a new report. New calculations by experts with the Chinese Academy of Sciences indicate that China’s highland glaciers are shrinking by an amount equivalent to all the water in the giant Yellow River each year.There is concern that the region’s water supplies, fed by glaciers and the monsoons and vital for around half the world’s population, may be harmed alongside the area’s abundant and rich wildlife. "Mountain...

BEIJING (Reuters) - China's massive project to pump water to its parched north has a problem: a lack of clean water to pump. The country has begun its ambitious South-North water diversion scheme, but widespread pollution and failure by regional governments to improve waste treatment were ruining available supplies, an official said at a symposium in Beijing on Tuesday, the U.N. World Water Day. When complete in 2050, the multi-billion dollar diversion scheme is intended to annually send 44.8 billion cubic meters of water from southern rivers to farms and cities in the dry north. "Many places have not implemented...

Feb. 3 — An Iraqi dam under construction on the Tigris River threatens to submerge the remains of the spiritual capital of the ancient Assyrian empire in an act archaeologists liken to flooding the Vatican.Much of the city of Ashur, which thrived for more than 1,000 years until the Babylonians razed it in 614 B.C., could vanish under a lake to be created by the Makhoul dam, U.S. and European archaeologists said.More than 60 outlying historical sites are also threatened.Ashur, or Assur, was of such importance that it lent its name to the Assyrian civilization itself."Losing it would be...

GRANTS PASS, Ore. (AP) -- More water flowing down the Klamath and Trinity Rivers in Northern California is giving the Yurok Tribe and California state biologists hope they will not see a repeat of last year's massive salmon kill. The tribe, however, is moving ahead with a lawsuit against the federal government claiming authorities violated treaty obligations by allowing the deaths of 33,000 adult salmon in the lower Klamath last September. And the tribe is pressing for higher flows at other times of the year. "While we are not as concerned about the flows (in August and September), we do...

At the end of a tumultuous week in the Klamath Reclamation Project, irrigation managers from the federal government and water users are focusing on what to do now. The week's events included a dramatic drop of inflows into Upper Klamath Lake and the announced shutdown of the project, a decision reversed within hours. The events focused attention on water use and the status of springs upstream of Upper Klamath Lake, which is the main reservoir for the project. "There is a whole list of things that could be hurting inflows, and ground water is one of them," he said, Jim...

Taxpayers will fund a sex-abuse survivor’s massages, but she’ll have to pay for her own bowel cleansing. The north-end Halifax woman, whose identity is protected by law, scored a partial victory with the Nova Scotia Court of Appeal yesterday. In a unanimous decision, the judges ordered the province to pay for the woman’s twice-weekly massages. They refused her claim for colonic therapy, a controversial practice where water is forced into the colon to remove fecal matter. The woman believes the practice is vital to her well-being, saying she hasn’t moved her bowels naturally since 1999. The money will come from...

ULM, Ark., Nov. 5 — Rice farmers like John Kerksieck are on the brink of draining one of Arkansas' biggest aquifers dry. That alone is troublesome, in a state that gets almost 50 inches of rain a year. But even more confounding — since these Southern farmers will not be the last to find themselves in such a pickle — is the question of what to do about it. Most of the farmers want the government to send them replacement water from the White River. The Army Corps of Engineers and the state support a plan to spend more than...