Drought in US northwest signals rising water-rights tensions

Drought on the California-Oregon border could see tensions rise between farmers who need water for agriculture and local tribes who want to sustain endangered fish species.

One of the worst droughts in memory in a massive agricultural region straddling the California-Oregon border in the United States could mean steep cuts to irrigation water for hundreds of farmers this summer to sustain endangered fish species critical to local tribes. The US Bureau of Reclamation, which oversees water allocations in the federally owned Klamath Project, is expected to announce this week how the season’s water will be divvied up after delaying the decision a month. For the first time in 20 years, it’s possible that the 1,400 irrigators who have farmed for generations on 91,000 hectares (225,000 acres) of reclaimed farmland will get no water at all — or so little that farming wouldn’t be worth it. Several tribes in Oregon and California are equally desperate for water to sustain threatened and endangered species of fish central to their heritage.