permaculture

[Cory Brennan <cory8570@yahoo.com>]

I hear you, Toby. It's so hard to get any real information from the news 
reports, which just adds to the confusion. One report says, in the same 
paragraph, that he is "just" catching rainwater, and that he is diverting a 
stream to fill his ponds. Not that it matters, I well understand how badly 
planned dams can screw up the watershed. I didn't see where he was using it 
to irrigate, sounded like he was using it to fish with his buddies. But who 
knows? one thing for sure, the media will not get it right, in some way or 
other. The lesson I've been trying to instill in people is this one:

1. Don't believe everything you read, and 2. there are usually issues that 
are important to know about that aren't even mentioned. 
 
Koreen Brennan

www.growpermaculture.com
www.facebook.com/growpermaculturenow
www.meetup.com/sustainable-urban-agriculture-coalition


________________________________
 From: Toby Hemenway <toby@patternliteracy.com>
To: permaculture <permaculture@lists.ibiblio.org> 
Sent: Saturday, October 27, 2012 7:54 PM
Subject: Re: [permaculture] this business of rain water
 
On Oct 27, 2012, at 4:19 PM, Cory Brennan wrote:

> Does anybody know what the downstream impacts actually were or what the 
> specific concerns are in that particular location? 

I think the issue was more that he was violating the water rights of 
downstream landowners and reducing streamflow, which will affect fish and 
wildlife. He was impounding significant quantities of surface runoff and 
using it to irrigate, which means some of it will evaporate and some of it 
will not return to the drainages it was taken from for some time or distance. 
I don't think the regulators have the manpower to assess harm; they just 
investigate violations of the law. It would be nice, I agree, if the 
regulators could look at every case, assess whether there was actual harm or 
even significant streamflow alteration, and then decide whether to issue a 
citation. And I know that sometimes that happens. But mostly it's "you've 
been warned of your code violation, you didn't stop, so we're gonna bust 
you." When I lived in Oregon I saw some really stupid ponds and failed dams, 
and saw people taking lots of water illegally that was going to cause harm
 downstream, so there is some justification for a flat policy.

Water rights in the US West have been a fighting issue since the Old World 
got here (and maybe before that). It comes with a history of murder, 
vandalism, house-burnings, and corruption. The state got involved to 
eliminate vigilantism and apply the rules more even-handedly rather than let 
the most powerful owners get all the water (though that still happens), and 
they're serious about it. So anyone dumb enough to repeatedly, willfully 
violate water rights--like that guy--is being very pattern illiterate (and 
I'll bet he pissed off some neighbor). 

I'd love to be able to put in ponds without an onerous permit process, but 
the former free-for-all didn't work, so we're stuck with the typical, 
bureaucratic solution, if you can call it that. If we don't act wisely, we 
end up with rules.

Toby
http://patternliteracy.com


> 
> Has there been adverse impacts from damming in that watershed? He had dams 
> there for a while; were they doing any actual damage that was documented? 
> (I understand that sometimes it's hard to document until it is "too late" 
> and much damage has been done) 
> 
> Sometimes, things get personal and the law uses its leverage to get even 
> with someone. Was anything like that happening here, I wonder? This guy 
> went to jail for doing this. That seems a bit extreme, but I read that he 
> had continued to ignore attempts to get him to stop.What would shut down 
> the rumor line on this faster than anything would be if there was some 
> specifics on the damage those lakes could do or were doing to that specific 
> area. 
> 
> K 
>  
> 
> 
> 
> ________________________________
> From: Frances and David <fdnokes@hotmail.com>
> To: permaculture <permaculture@lists.ibiblio.org> 
> Sent: Saturday, October 27, 2012 3:26 PM
> Subject: Re: [permaculture] this business of rain water
> 
> Excellent reply, Tony!
> I recall the discussion but wasn't sure how to find it.
> Thanks for reiterating and embellishing these points.
> The thing that struck me about this was that it is an obvious need of 
> people 
> to protect their communal water supply.
> There would be a lot of concern if that was challenged!  So, this was 
> barking up the wrong tree as if just for the sake of barking.
> Definitely a candidate for the nomer 'fear mongering'.
> Can I quote you? With or without credit?
> Thanks again.
> Be well.
> Frances
> 
> -----Original Message----- 
> From: Toby Hemenway
> Sent: Saturday, October 27, 2012 11:59 AM
> To: permaculture
> Subject: Re: [permaculture] this business of rain water
> 
> 
> 
> On Oct 26, 2012, at 9:58 PM, Frances and David wrote:
> 
>> http://worldtruth.tv/oregon-claims-state-ownership-over-all-rainwater/
>> it’s coming up again
>> and I’m wondering
>> is this really as scary as it is made to look?
> 
> Not to worry. Do some Googling about this  if you want to get the facts. 
> The 
> guy was illegally and unwisely diverting and damming streams, not catching 
> rain. A couple of paranoid "government is always evil" bloggers completely 
> distorted what had happened. Most of what is in this article is untrue: for 
> example, if you pave an area over a certain small size (varies by county), 
> you must mitigate the runoff, get a permit, and deal properly with its 
> impact on stream flow, contrary to what the article says. And the quoted 
> state official does not say they own the rain or own the water, he says 
> they 
> regulate how water is handled by landowners--which means once it hits the 
> ground and enters the surface and groundwater cycles. Big difference.
> 
> Oregon allows rainwater harvesting without a permit in most circumstances. 
> Once rain lands on the ground it is considered a common, regulated 
> resource--like forests on public land--and cannot be held in quantity 
> without a permit (garden ponds excepted), though it can be drained or sunk 
> with swales without a permit in many cases. Overland flow (not rain!) 
> cannot 
> diverted from downstream--and from other users, and fish, and 
> wetlands--without having your system okayed, which makes sense to me. Too 
> many badly designed ponds have done too much damage to watercourses and 
> wildlife, hence they tightened the permit process a while back.
> 
> Toby
> http://patternliteracy.com
> 
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Frances, I don’t have to consult a dictionary to understand the meaning of 
traditional farming.  I grew up in the 50s on a small family farm in the 
North of Europe.  I can’t remember if there was a tractor in the village at 
that time.  But we certainly didn't have the money to afford one.  Nor did we 
have money to buy fertilizers or herbicides.  My grandfather cultivated the 
land like it had always been cultivated.  Today, I live in a poor region in 
the South of Europe.  My land has never seen a tractor or any other heavy 
equipment.  The previous owner cultivated the land with a donkey like 
generations before him.

So, the meaning of traditional farming and what it was like to produce most 
of what you needed for life is still in the living memory, even though it 
seems totally incomprehensible to most contemporaries who have lived all 
their life in an industrial society.

I appreciate Permaculture for its emphasis on practical solutions, yet I 
think there is a basic approach in NF that isn't very well reflected in PC.  
As I said, it is impossible to exactly copy NF methods from the Far East, yet 
I do find inspiring the examples of some NF pioneers who have farmed their 
land for decades without mechanization and without fertilizers or any other 
external input.  Even if we cannot use their exact same methods, it 
demonstrates that we can, under certain circumstances, do without any 
external inputs, and that it should not be our first priority to soak our 
land with all kinds of amendments.

Cheers, 
Dieter