Take Action for the North Fork of the Smith River

Protect the North Fork of the Smith River water quality by providing comments to the Oregon DEQ Please take a moment to express support for protecting the invaluable North Fork of the Smith River which waters flow into the iconic Smith River in northern California. Eight decades of important protections have been secured for the Smith River through the Redwood State and National Park, Wild and Scenic river designations as well as the Smith River National Recreation Area Designations. Incredibly, in spite of all this great work to protect the Smith - a threat still exists.  An international mining company is actively pursuing plans to develop a nickel strip mine in the headwaters of the wild and scenic North Fork of the Smith River here in Oregon.  The Red Flat Nickel Corporation would locate their mine south of the Kalmiopsis Wilderness within the Baldface Creek drainage, which is a key tributary to the NF Smith. By protecting Bald Face Creek we protect superb habitat for steelhead and protect the water quality within the Smith River basin which will help all the steelhead that call the Smith home. Support the proposal to designate outstanding resource waters in Oregon.  Comments are being accepted until April 20th! Simply go to to the Oregon DEQ's website, HERE, and add your support. Below is a sample letter you can copy and paste if you like. “My name is_________________ and I support and encourage the Oregon Environmental Quality Commission to designate the North Fork Smith River and its tributaries located in southwest Oregon, as Outstanding Resource Waters.  State and Federal agencies, sportsmen and recreation enthusiasts all recognize the exceptional water quality of the NF Smith and the valuable fisheries, which includes threatened species and critical habitat.  The watersheds of the North Fork Smith River have ecological significance, as well as, hosting many rare and unique plant species.”  Please share and thank you for supporting wild steelhead protections.

Something Stinks in Montana

Photo: The Washington Times

Please check out Bombs Away on one of our favorite blogs, Fly Fishing In Yellowstone National Park, noting the recent spill of 35 million gallons of sewage effluent into the Gallatin River.

Money quote: "Rich people poop."

Helpful links are offered, including one to the Chi Wulf blog which has done a good job of covering this.

Money quote from Jess McGlothlin on Chi Wulf: "Sewage Effluent Runs Through It."

The Gila River: Free Flowing Forever

Sit for a spell with Dutch Salmon and learn more about another gem of a river under threat.

Rivers In Trouble

The poet Charles Bukowski said it:

"The problem with the world is

that the intelligent people are full of doubts

while the stupid ones are full of confidence."

Get the full list of rivers HERE.

Now, what is it you're still unsure of?

"De-watering" and The Green River

Just How Precious Is Earth's Water?

Think water conservation isn't that big a deal? Take a look at this eye-opener from EarthSky, and then see what you think.

We think of Earth as the water planet. But what if you could take all of the water on Earth and form it into a sphere, or bubble? How big would the bubble be? The U.S. Geological Survey (USGS) has the answer. All the water on Earth would fit into a sphere 860 miles (1,385 km) wide. That’s a lot smaller than Earth itself, as the drawing below shows.

Surprised? Water planet, you said? In fact, there’s a lot of water in the large blue sphere depicted above. The largest sphere – representing all water on, in, and above Earth – would be about 860 miles (about 1,385 kilometers) in diameter. That’s in contrast to about 8,000 miles (about 12.5 thousand kilometers) for Earth. 

Or to put it another way, the largest blue sphere above holds 332,500,000 cubic miles (or 1,386,000,000 cubic kilometers (km3) water. We writers are always looking for analogies, but the best one I can think of to describe this amount is … well, it’s about as much as all the water on Earth.

See the smaller sphere over Kentucky? It represents Earth’s liquid fresh water in groundwater, swamp water, rivers, and lakes.

And do you see the even smaller (very tiny) bubble over Atlanta, Georgia? That one represents fresh water in all the lakes and rivers on the planet. USGS says that most of the water people and other earthly life require every day comes from these surface-water sources.

Bottom line: USGS says that all the water on Earth would fit into a sphere 860 miles (1,385 km) wide.

Read more about this story from USGS