Postcard from the Desert
Growing crops among the cacti.
Last week, I spent a good amount of time in the Sonoran desert, convincing folks to let my team follow them to their RV parks and off-the-grid adobe houses. I was there to report on water, a tenuous story complicated by the fact that many Arizonans do not have Colorado River water rights. Instead, they pump water from the ground.
One of the most jarring aspects of the American desertscape is the alfalfa. I’ve written about alfalfa in the desert before. Something about seeing it this time, though, as I sweat through my shirt and and guzzled water bottle after water bottle, was striking.
I’m working on a story about my time in the desert and what it means to be a good neighbor. This is an ethical question I cannot answer in my reporting alone. But the question continues to come to mind as I keep reporting on issues related to water: does a good neighbor allow their manure to contaminate the water of their neighbors downstream? Does a good neighbor pump quantities of groundwater so excessive they leave their neighbors with nothing?
How we treat our water determines whether people can survive in a region. And in some regions, that survival is slipping away faster than we can comprehend.
Here are some things I’ve worked on since I last wrote:
In Iowa, Researchers Press for More Scrutiny of the Link Between Big Ag and Cancer Risk (Sentient)
Manure Contributes to Toxic Byproducts in Drinking Water (Sentient)
https://www.pbs.org/newshour/politics/in-drought-stricken-arizona-fresh-scrutiny-of-saudi-arabia-owned-farms-water-use#:~:text=The%20United%20Arab%20Emirates%2Downed,East%20%E2%80%94%20mainly%20to%20Saudi%20Arabia.
One of the fascinating aspects of desert alfalfa is that some of it gets exported to the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia (and perhaps the United Arab Emirates, too) to feed dairy cows. Essentially we are exporting our precious water along with the hay. (Ironically, the word "alfalfa" comes
originally from an Arabic word.)