smackaholic wrote:
Sorry, I should have said the central valley. The central coast does have it's fair share of agriculture although I do believe that even they don't get a hell of a lot of rain during the dry season and likely rely on some irrigation. But, at least they don't have to ship their water in from 800 miles away.
The Sacramento Valley is fed by the Sacramento River. Catch is, fucker dries up during the dry season. But a buncha people are dependent on pumping it dry, so they pump out another river (tributary of the Klamath) clean over the Cascades to keep it flowing year round.
The whole area of far nothern california and Southern Oregon is pretty hit-and-miss on water. If you're near a river that drains the big mountain ranges, you have it, and they generally impound it. Away from a river... you're SOL.
You see Washington high up that list. Most of that is Eastern Washington. Huge freaking desert prarie, that gets ever-so-slightly more rain than Phoenix... that has a really huge river running through it, so they farm the fuck out of it (sup Trampis). Eastern Oregon sits on a massive plateau at high elevation, and it's much harder to move water around, so doesn't have the level of agriculture Eastern Washington does. They still grow their share of onions, potatoes, and wheat.
