Working Groups: Citizen Restoration

Protect Your Drinking Water
By Sarah Mae Tone, IVGID

Local water suppliers at Lake Tahoe are dedicated to providing clean and safe drinking water to our communities. The Nevada Tahoe Water Supplier Association is a united voice advocating the protection of Lake Tahoe from contaminants that are potentially harmful to our health.

Nationally, water suppliers are challenged by sudden changes in pollutant types and quantities entering drinking water sources. Nevada entities, including Kingsbury General Improvement District (GID), Edgewood Water Company, Glenbrook Water Company, Round Hill GID, Douglas County, and Incline Village GID, have met informally over the last 10 years to exchange technical water supply information. In forums, the group discussed new legislation that recommends protecting the water source as an effective way to defend against harmful drinking water pollutants. Dan St. John, IVGID public works director, stated, “It is much more efficient to protect the source than to treat water after contamination.” The group stresses the importance of considering the overall quality of Lake Tahoe’s water in addition to protecting its famous clarity.

Local residents and visitors can help keep our drinking water clean by reducing pollutants that enter Lake Tahoe. Simple changes in daily activities help reduce pollutant loads. These include practicing sanitary boating and jet skiing, using provided restroom facilities, picking up after your pet, conserving water and properly disposing of household hazardous waste. In general, consider the source first. Don’t let anything get into your water that you wouldn’t want to drink!

For more tips or general information visit www.nevadatahoewater.org

last modified: April 12 2005

Nevada Tahoe Water Supplier Association (NTWSA)
The Nevada Tahoe Water Supplier Association (NTWSA) formed to ensure Compliance with the Federal Safe Drinking Water Act on the Nevada shore of Lake Tahoe. The NTWSA is a collaborative of water suppliers on the Nevada side of the Tahoe Basin. These agencies pull water out of the lake to supply local residents’ drinking water. Because the water is quite pure, for most of these suppliers, costly water filtration processes are not required. This is due to the consistently low turbidity, and low occurrence or absence of bacteria and viruses in our water supply, Lake Tahoe. The drinking water is treated with ozone and chlorine to kill bacteria and viruses.

The Safe Drinking Water Act’s Surface Water Treatment Rule requires that these utilities develop a “Watershed Control Program” (WCP) to protect their water source from future contamination that may affect human health and to make regular reports to show that additional filtration equipment is not needed.

Because local agencies and property owners are doing so much to protect the lake’s water quality, some of the requirements of standard watershed control programs are already being met. However, one important missing component of our current watershed control programs is the control of pathogens that may harm human health. Because of this, the WCP will be most useful in preventing these types of water quality problems. The main threats likely to affect drinking water are pathogens, such as coliform bacteria, cryptosporidium, and Giardia; and viruses. For this reason, the NTWSA watershed control program addresses sources of these kinds of contaminants, such as leaking sanitary sewers, pet waste, and improper disposal of human waste, such as from boats, hikers or recreationists.

The NTWSA is composed of staff from Kingsbury General Improvement District, Edgewood Water Company, Zephyr Cove Utility Company (Douglas County), Glenbrook Utility Company, and the Round Hill General Improvement District. Incline Village General Improvement District is both a participating member and staffs the association. NTWSA also collaborates with local nonprofits and federal agencies, most notably, the Nevada Tahoe Conservation District. For more info contact Sarah Tone, IVGID Waste Not, (775) 831-8603 or wastenot@ivgid.org.

last modified: August 30 2004

Integrating Hazardous Fuel Reduction with Ecological Restoration
By John Cobourn

This year, an unprecedented number of natural resource managers and planners are working closely with Lake Tahoe’s fire protection districts to integrate fire prevention practices with efforts to restore the ecosystem of the Tahoe Basin. While public awareness of fire danger has been growing for years, last fall’s disastrous wildfires in suburban Southern California focused national attention on the need to address unsafe conditions in neighborhoods close to wildlands.

At Lake Tahoe, interagency groups have studied this issue since at least 1992, when the Forest Health Consensus Group began addressing the unnatural condition of Tahoe’s forests. There are two main reasons why Tahoe’s forests are unhealthy. First, the original old-growth forests at Lake Tahoe were systematically logged 1870 - 1900, to provide timber for the vast mine system constructed in Virginia City during the famous Comstock silver boom. After the clearcutting of Tahoe’s forests ended, the “second growth” forest that grew back had many small trees growing close together. As the forest matured over the next 100 years, the trees grew tall, but they were too densely stocked for all to remain healthy during periods of less than normal precipitation. During droughts such as the one of the late 1980s and early 1990s, the trees competed for scarce moisture. Many were too weak to resist attacks by bark beetles and other forest diseases. As a result, Tahoe forests have suffered from tree die-offs for the past decade.

The other factor causing unhealthy forest conditions has been our vigorous suppression of all wildfires for the past 100 years. Forest fires were relatively common at Tahoe before European-Americans arrived. They usually burned slowly along the forest floor, consuming dead branches and weak trees and shrubs, and leaving the large trees alive. These “low intensity” wildfires are actually good for our forest ecosystem. Our forest management agencies are reintroducing such fires each year as “controlled burns.” Such practices can clear out the high-hazard dead fuel that has accumulated on the forest floor for decades.

New Forest Management Plans Underway

In late 2003, after catastrophic wildfires decimated much of Southern California, the Tahoe Regional Planning Agency (TRPA) Governing Board directed its staff to make forest thinning and fuels reduction projects a top priority. By February 2004, U.S. Sen. Diane Feinstein, D-Calif., and California Assemblyman Tim Leslie, R-Tahoe City, had requested a share of the Federal Healthy Forest Restoration Act money to fund increased forest thinning and prescribed burning projects at Lake Tahoe.

As part of this effort, TRPA is working closely with the fire protection districts in the basin to gather their input in the form of community fire plans, and to merge these plans into a basin-wide fire plan in the summer of 2004. The fire safe councils on the Nevada and California shores are working with the Lake Tahoe Environmental Education Coalition (LTEEC) and others to inform the public about these efforts and encourage public involvement in the plans.

What Residents Can Do at Home

What is good for the Tahoe community and environment at the forest level is also beneficial to private property owners. Wildfire experts have been encouraging homeowners for more than 10 years to implement defensible space practices around their structures to increase their “survivability” in a wildfire. This year more than ever, education about defensible space is being combined with education about best management practices (BMPs), which protect the lake’s water quality and ecosystem. Rather than making two separate plans that might not be totally consistent, homeowners will save money and time by planning and installing their BMPs and defensible space activities together.

Members of the Partners in Conservation (PIC) coalition, who assist private property owners in implementing BMPs, are currently meeting with fire protection districts to agree on ways to work together.

The Home Landscaping Guide for Lake Tahoe, which is given out free during site evaluations, has a detailed chapter on defensible space that makes the point that fire prevention is not at odds with erosion control practices. In the “lean, clean and green” space, extending 30 feet from structures, shrubs can be cut down without removing the roots. In addition low-growing, low-fire-hazard plants can be irrigated, and mulch and new plants can cover bare soil. For people who want to maintain a small patch of turf, this is the best place for it. A one-inch to two-inch layer of pine or fir needles can be left on bare ground as a mulch to decay over time. Property managers should never rake all needles, leaving only bare soil, as this creates a serious erosion hazard. However, within 5 feet of structures, fire districts recommend use of a noncombustible mulch, such as gravel or river rock.

Why Integrate Fire Prevention and Water Quality Protection?

We should educate people to look at several issues at once. If we fail to address the hazardous fuel loading in our forests, the basin could be ravaged by a high intensity wildfire that could kill most of the trees for thousands of acres. Such a catastrophic wildfire could also burn many homes and lead to a large increase of polluted runoff into the lake. Nobody wants to see that happen. On the other hand, there is also a danger that if we become too intensely focused on fire prevention, we could lose sight of the need to restore the whole ecosystem at Tahoe. If we pour all our money into fuel reduction, even far away from our neighborhoods, we could actually reduce valuable wildlife habitat. If we remove too much vegetative ground cover and rake pine needles down to bare soil, we will create polluted runoff that flows down our street drains to degrade the lake.

For homeowners, one reason to combine defensible space and BMP education is the practicality of addressing both needs at once. If you can combine the installation of required BMPs with the installation of effective defensible space around your home, you can save time, trouble and money. There are agencies to help make this process easy for you. To request a free BMP site evaluation, you can call the Tahoe Resource Conservation District, (530) 543-1501, ext.6; or the Nevada Tahoe Conservation District, (775) 786-7223, ext.1. For commercial or multi-family residential properties, call the Erosion Control Team, (775)588-4547, ext. 202.

last modified: August 30 2004

Building Blocks for an Outreach Campaign
Examples of the messages, audiences, distribution methods, and evaluation tools currently being employed by the LTEEC partners are listed below.

MESSAGES

• Avoid wasteful water use
  
• Don’t rake pine needles down to bare soil
  
• Fertilize properly to keep harmful fertilizers out of the lake
  
• Implement defensible space to reduce fire risk
  
• Install Best Management Practices (BMPs) to reduce the impacts of erosion
  
• Keep lawn areas limited and use native vegetation
  
• Pick up after pets to prevent nutrients and bacteria from reaching Lake Tahoe
  
• Reduce nonpoint source pollution to prevent the loss of clarity in Lake Tahoe
  
• Students should participate in service-learning projects
  
• Sweep driveways into a dust pan instead of using blowers or hosing with water to reduce dust and runoff
  
• Teachers can use Tahoe’s local environment as an integrating context for learning

AUDIENCES
Current efforts are aimed at reaching the following audiences:

• Boat Owners
  
• Contractors
  
• Local homeowners
  
• New homeowners
  
• Pet Owners
  
• Students
  
• Teachers

Future programs will need to be aimed at reaching :

• Businesses
  
• Seasonal employees
  
• Second homeowners
  
• Visitors

DISTRIBUTION METHODS

• Internet
  
• Newsletter
  
• Posters
  
• Presentations (e.g. homeowner associations, classrooms)
  
• Print media (4 Tahoe newspapers)
  
• Publications (i.e. Home Landscape Guide)
  
• Symposium
  
• Television (Lake Tahoe Report)
  
• Video/DVD
  
• Volunteer events
  
• Workshops

EVALUATION

• Evaluation surveys
  
• Focus groups
  
• Longitudinal telephone surveys
  
• Measuring impacts (number of BMPs installed, number of phone calls received)
  
• Phone calls and E-mail contacts
  
• Pre- and post-tests
  
• Web site hits

last modified: August 30 2004

NRCS Assists Schoolyard Makeover to Protect Lake Tahoe
By John Stern, Public Affairs, NRCS

A unique conservation effort partnered an elementary school with NRCS, the Tahoe Resource Conservation District, and parents and volunteers. Kindergarten, fourth and fifth graders joined parents and teachers wielding shovels, wheelbarrows and buckets, to complete the first stage of a Best Management Practices (BMPs) school yard makeover.

The project was the brainstorm of TRCD Conservation Leader, Scott Cecchi and Jan Ellis of the Sierra Watershed Education Partnership (SWEP). Adding BMPs will help the Tahoe Lake Elementary School comply with lake protection ordinances that require developed properties in the Tahoe Basin be retrofitted with measures to protect water quality. The intent is to protect Tahoe's world-renowned water clarity. NRCS furnished technical support in choosing appropriate plant materials, and provided advice on engineering options. NRCS also contributed some materials, including terracing stones, gravel, native plants, and topsoil, as part of this demonstration project.

Tahoe Lake Elementary teachers designed curriculum and activities to take advantage of the project’s multiple learning opportunities. They use project-based real-world learning, an interdisciplinary teaching approach shown by education researchers to increase student self-discipline and to produce substantial gains in math, science and language arts learning. Curriculum that connects student learning with their environment will be used as a prototype to target similar future partnerships with other schools in the Tahoe Basin.

last modified: December 13 2004

Lake Tahoe is Losing Water Clarity
Lake Tahoe waters have been losing transparency at an average of about one foot each year since the late 1960s.

Lake Tahoe’s exceptional clarity is a result of the absence of suspended sediment and free-floating, single-celled algae in the water. Given undisturbed conditions, the lake’s water quality would change so slowly the changes would be undetectable over a human lifetime. Human settlements and logging activities that began in the late 1880s have contributed to the rapidly declining clarity. Lake Tahoe’s clarity has decreased by more than 33 percent since the 1960s and is steadily declining at the rate of one foot a year. Scientists say that the rate of water quality deterioration at Lake Tahoe has been steady for so long it may become irreversible in 10 years.

Lake Tahoe’s water quality problems are not caused by industry or by wastewater treatment plants. The causes of water pollution are the daily activities of the thousands of residents and visitors in the Lake Tahoe watershed. We all need to learn to reduce our impact on the environment—impacts like erosion, over-fertilization, spills, leaks, and disturbances of soils and stream environment zones.

last modified: December 27 2005

Fish Species of the Lake Tahoe Basin
Lake Tahoe Report #151
January 9, 2006
By John Cobourn and Heather Segale

In terms of lakes, Tahoe is a relatively harsh environment for fish. It was cutoff from other bodies of water many thousands of years ago, so as it evolved, only seven species of fish evolved in it. However, since the introduction of humans and human intervention at Lake Tahoe, that number has changed.

According to Brant Allen, fisheries biologist with the UC Davis Tahoe Environmental Research Center, “The original native game fish was the Lahontan cutthroat trout, which is no longer in the lake. But, there are still six native species of fish swimming in Tahoe.” The Lahontan cutthroat trout, named for the distinctive red streak under its chin, once topped Lake Tahoe’s food chain and weighed as much as 40 pounds. This fish thrived in the Tahoe Basin and migrated the length of the Truckee River between Tahoe and Pyramid Lake.

The native fish that still survive in Lake Tahoe include:

· The mountain whitefish (Prosopium willaimsoni) is Lake Tahoe’s only native game fish. It lives near the bottom to a depth of about 100 feet.

· The Lahontan redside shiner (Richardsonius egregious) is a native minnow that is abundant in the shallow shorezone and can usually be seen in large numbers around marinas and rock crib piers. It grows to 3 to 4 inches long.

· The Lahontan speckled dace (Rhinichthys osculus) is another native minnow that grows to about 2 to 3 inches long. It is difficult to find, as it seeks the cover of rocky substrate on the bottom of the lake.

· The tui chub (Gila bicolor) is a bottom-oriented chub that feeds on zooplankton or sediments on the bottom of the lake.

· The Tahoe sucker (Catostomus tahoensis) is a bottom feeder that grows to about 16 inches long.

· The Paiute sculpin (Cottus beldingi) grows to about 3 inches long. It lives under rocks and is rarely observed in less than 10 feet of water.

The native Lahontan cutthroat trout went extinct in Lake Tahoe in 1939, due in part to overfishing, competition with nonnative species, and the development of dams. In particular, Derby Dam below Reno and Sparks and the Tahoe Outlet Dam in Tahoe City isolated the Tahoe population of cutthroat trout from other populations within the historic range.

Beginning in the late 1800s, when the effects of human environmental changes had reduced the numbers of Lahontan cutthroat in the lake, humans began introducing nonnative fish species in hopes of increasing Tahoe’s yield of game fish. These introductions included lake trout from the Great Lakes, Chinook salmon, Atlantic salmon, golden trout, Arctic grayling, Great Lakes whitefish, brook trout, brown trout, and rainbow trout. Of these fish species, the lake trout, brown trout, brook trout, and rainbow trout were able to establish self-supporting populations in the Tahoe Basin.

In the 20th century, additional introductions of nonnative invertebrates and fish further altered the Tahoe Basin ecosystem. Using the best available science at the time, exotic species were introduced with the intention of adding a recreational component or supporting an existing fishery. Unfortunately, not all of the species behaved as expected in the clear, cold waters of the Tahoe Basin.

After 70 years of alteration, the aquatic ecosystem now supports nonnative lake trout (Mackinaw) as the top predator. They are accompanied by rainbow trout, brown trout and kokanee salmon, providing multiple recreational fishing opportunities for shallow and deep-line anglers. The native Lahontan cutthroat trout is now among the most endangered western salmonids. Fortunately, as noted above, the other six native Tahoe fish species have survived the planned exotic introductions and continue to thrive within the Tahoe Basin.

In recent years, new threats to Tahoe’s remaining native fish have arisen. A number of warm-water fish species have been illegally introduced to Lake Tahoe, including largemouth and smallmouth bass, crappie, and sunfish. While these fish are typically associated with warm-water environments, their populations are able to grow and spread within the Tahoe Basin. Taking advantage of seasonally warm water in bays and marinas, the fish feed on native minnows and successfully spawn.

Scientists from University of California Davis and University of Nevada Reno plan to study the potential expansion of these species, and with help from the USDA Forest Service Lake Tahoe Basin Management Unit, implement a plan for their control. “The warm-water invasive species appear to pose a great risk to Tahoe’s remaining native species,” states Brant Allen a research biologist for UC Davis. “Their ability to consume large numbers of fish and the apparent overlap with native minnow spawning areas is a big concern.”

Warm-water fish invasions are not new to California. Nearby Lake Davis continues to experience problems resulting from the illegal introduction of northern pike, a voracious predator. Controlling the spread of similar species in the Tahoe Basin could go a long way to preserving native fish and assist the recovery of Tahoe’s once great Lahontan cutthroat trout.

The Lake Tahoe Report is a collaboration between John Cobourn, Water Resource Specialist with University of Nevada Cooperative Extension, and Heather Segale, Education and Outreach Coordinator for the University of California, Davis. For more information, contact Heather Segale, (530) 583-3279, or logon to www.lteec.org, www.tahoe.unr.edu, or terc.ucdavis.edu.

last modified: January 10 2006

Bald Eagle Viewing More Likely During the Winter
Lake Tahoe Report #153
January 23, 2006
By Heather Segale and John Cobourn

Sighting a bald eagle is a magnificent experience, especially after the bald eagle’s near extinction in the not-so-distant past. The bald eagle population fell to endangered levels of less than 500 pairs in the early 1960s due to hunting, habitat loss and contamination of waterways and food sources by various pollutants and pesticides, most notably DDT.

There was a similar drop in eagle populations at Lake Tahoe during the late 1980s, when the two nest sites in the basin were both inactive. There are usually only one or two pairs of bald eagles in the Tahoe Basin during the summer. However, during the winter, bald eagles migrate to Tahoe because it is more temperate than Alaska and Canada. According to wildlife biologist Stewart McMorrow, “as many as 20 eagles have been counted in the Tahoe Basin during the winter months.”

Bald eagles live near large bodies of open water, such as lakes, marshes, seacoasts and rivers, where there are plenty of fish to eat and tall trees for nesting and roosting. Bald eagles feed primarily on fish, but also eat small animals, such as ducks, coots, muskrats, turtles, rabbits, and snakes. Occasionally, they also eat dead animals. They are a kind of predator called raptors. They swoop down to seize fish in their powerful, long and sharp talons. They exert approximately 1,000 pounds of pressure per square inch in each foot. They can carry their food off in flight, but can only lift about half their weight. Bald eagles can fly at speeds of about 65 miles per hour in level flight, and up to 150 or 200 miles per hour in a dive.

Bald eagles are monogamous and mate for life. A Bald eagle will only select another mate if its faithful companion dies. They build large nests, called eyries, at the top of sturdy, tall trees. The nests become larger as the eagles return to breed and add new nesting materials year after year. Bald eagles make their new nests an average of 2 feet deep and 5 feet wide. Eventually, some nests become 10 feet wide and weigh several tons. When a nest is destroyed by natural causes, it is often rebuilt nearby. Bald eagles line their nests with twigs, soft mosses, grasses and feathers.

The female lays one to three eggs each spring, which hatch after about 35 days of incubation. Feathers of newly hatched bald eaglets are light grey, and turn dark brown before they leave the nest in about 12 weeks. When they are 3 or 4 years old, bald eagles have mottled brown and white feathers under their wings and on their heads, tails and breasts. The distinctive white head and tail feathers do not appear until they are about 4 to 5 years old. Their beaks and eyes also turn from dark brown to yellow during this time.

Bald eagles are about 29 to 42 inches long, can weigh 7 to 15 pounds, and have a wingspan of 6 to 8 feet. This makes them one of the largest birds in North America. Females are larger than males, but both have white heads and tail feathers and yellow beaks.

The bald eagle is our national symbol, so when it became threatened with extinction in the 1960s, people took notice. Strong endangered species and environmental protection laws, as well as active private, state and federal conservation efforts, have brought back the bald eagle population from the edge of extinction in the United States. The use of DDT pesticide is now outlawed in the United States, which has contributed greatly to the return of the bald eagle to America's skies. There are now over 5,000 nesting pairs and 20,000 total birds in the lower 48 states. There are over 35,000 bald eagles in Alaska.

There are several other common raptors living at least part of the year in the Lake Tahoe Basin. One of the most common is the osprey, which is somewhat similar in appearance to the bald eagle, having white markings on its head and throat and a dark brown back and tail. It also preys mostly on fish. Most nests that you see in the Tahoe Basin are osprey nests. Sometimes eagles will steal freshly caught fish from the slightly smaller ospreys.

Forest hawks, which do not fish for food, include the sharp-shinned hawk, the Cooper’s hawk, and the northern goshawk. Such raptors are called accipiters. Other raptors in the Basin include the merlin, the great horned owl, the western screech owl, the flammulated owl, the northern Pigmy owl, the northern Saw-whet owl, and the rare California spotted owl. Red tail hawks also frequent Tahoe, and peregrine falcons sometimes pass through the region.

For more information about the birds of the Tahoe Basin, visit http://www.fs.fed.us/r5/ltbmu/recreation/wildlife/birds.shtml.

The Lake Tahoe Report is a collaboration between John Cobourn, Water Resource Specialist with University of Nevada Cooperative Extension, and Heather Segale, Education and Outreach Coordinator for the University of California, Davis. For more information, contact Heather Segale, (530) 583-3279, or logon to www.lteec.org, www.tahoe.unr.edu, or terc.ucdavis.edu.

last modified: January 23 2006

Lake of the Sky - The Lake Tahoe Story
A Robust Multimedia Presentation by David C. Antonucci

Amazing Facts and True Stories About Lake Tahoe:

Lake of the Sky — The Lake Tahoe Story brings the mysteries and science of Lake Tahoe to everyone. Using state of the art multimedia techniques, the viewer experiences an exciting and informative journey of discovery. Accompanied by live narration from a qualified environmental scientist, the audience will explore the mystique of Lake Tahoe. Participants will have greater understanding, leading to a deeper appreciation and lasting memories of Lake Tahoe.

Centered around the most frequently asked questions and mysteries of Lake Tahoe, the 45-minute presentation covers the Lake’s most fascinating and timely aspects. Viewers will learn about the natural forces that created Lake Tahoe and take a virtual dive into the underwater world. They will experience the pioneer movement, follow historic trails and live through Tahoe’s Gilded Age. Using simple and easy to understand concepts, scientific concerns are explained together with the future plans to protect the Lake. Live narration complemented by ample graphics, video and animation scenes make the presentation lively and interesting. The presentation is fully customizable to provide more detail or additional subjects of interest to the audience. Examples are recreation, geology, water resources and biological resources.

• How was Lake Tahoe formed?
  
• How large and deep is Lake Tahoe?
  
• How much water is in Lake Tahoe?
  
• Where does the water go?
  
• Why is it so blue?
  
• How cold is the water?
  
• Does it ever freeze?
  
• Is Lake Tahoe's clarity threatened?
  
• What is the history of Tahoe?

Learn the answers to these and many more exciting facts about Lake Tahoe in Lake of the Sky — The Lake Tahoe Story.

Fees and Charges: Base fee is $295 for groups up to 150 persons in the Lake Tahoe area and includes audiovisual equipment and setup.
About the Presenter: David C. Antonucci is a 30-year resident of Lake Tahoe. He holds B.S. and M.S. degrees in environmental engineering. He has been directly involved with plans and activities to protect Lake Tahoe throughout his 32-year career and is considered an expert on Lake Tahoe environmental issues. He has served on many boards and organizations dedicated to visitor interpretation and preservation of Lake Tahoe.

Contact information:
David C. Antonucci
Phone: 530-525-5410
Fax: 530-525-7745
Email: dcantonucci@msn.com
P. O. Box 1050
7205 Antelope Way
Homewood, CA 96141-1050

last modified: January 24 2005

Where Does Your Drinking Water Come From?
By Michelle Sweeney,
Nevada Tahoe Conservation District

If you live in the Lake Tahoe Basin, the water that comes out of your tap has made a fascinating journey in order to arrive in your glass. Let’s take one possible scenario. If you live on the Nevada side of the lake, chances are you are among those who get water from Lake Tahoe itself. On the way to your faucet the water travels through underground pipes after undergoing an ozonation process at a local facility. Ozonation zaps the unwanted materials in the water, “purifying” it, helping to make it safe to drink. In order to get to the ozone facility, the water is drawn from deep in Lake Tahoe.

Where does Lake Tahoe water come from? It all comes from precipitation, in the form of rain or snow, that falls within the “bowl” of mountains surrounding the lake. Of course, rain and snow that gets to the lake first travels through our watersheds. This means that the water that comes out of your kitchen faucet may have traveled over your yard or down the streets you drive on each day. This is one reason why it is important to consider how we do things in the Basin. Controlling erosion on your property, applying a minimal amount of fertilizer in your yard, picking up after your pets and ensuring gasoline doesn’t overflow from your car’s gas tank are all actions we can take to keep our drinking water clean. So next time you turn on the faucet, think about it: Where does your water come from and are you doing all that you can to ensure that it’s the best it can be?

last modified: June 17 2003

Erosion Control, Revegetation and Restoration Training Workshop
The Third Annual Erosion Control, Revegetation and Restoration Training Workshop was held June 6-8, 2001 in South Lake Tahoe. This workshop presented principles and methods of erosion control, revegetation, and stream and wetland restoration. With mornings in the classroom and afternoons in the field, more than 40 participants received hands-on experience revegetating an erosion site and stabilizing a streambank with biotechnical techniques.

Training workshops are taught by Steve Goldman and Michael Hogan and are sponsored by the California Conservation Corps and the Packard Foundation. LTEEC’s Citizen Restoration Working Group hopes to continue holding workshops annually and may expand the program to include sites in both California and Nevada.

The 2002 workshop dates will be announced soon. We are currently seeking funding to continue this valuable program.

last modified: June 18 2002

Home Landscaping Guide for Lake Tahoe and Vicinity
The second edition of the Home Landscaping Guide for Lake Tahoe and Vicinity is now available. This edition has been revised to include information about the new pine needle mulch recommendations and new Best Management Practice (BMP) technologies. (The book is essentially the same as the first edition, so if you already have a copy, you do not need to get a new one.) The book is available for a donation of $5 at TRPA, University of Nevada Cooperative Extension, Conservation Districts, League to Save Lake Tahoe, and most local nurseries. You can receive a free copy as part of a free BMP site evaluation by calling (775) 588-4547, Ext. 202, or (530) 573-2754.

The Home Landscaping Guide for Lake Tahoe and Vicinity is the result of two years of collaboration between Cooperative Extension, the Tahoe Regional Planning Agency, the Natural Resource Conservation Service, the Resource Conservation Districts and others. The book helps homeowners design landscapes, control erosion, maintain native vegetation and wildlife habitat, improve soil and irrigate efficiently. It contains suggested plan lists, pest-management tips and defensible space practices to protect homes from wildfire. The book is a major component of Cooperative Extension's Tahoe Landscaping and Backyard Conservation Program, which includes workshops for professionals, block meetings with information on good landscape management techniques and Master Gardener volunteer activities.

"We hope this guide helps homeowners achieve their individual landscape goals, while encouraging them to implement appropriate landscape practices that preserve the lake's unique environment," said John Cobourn, water resource specialist and principle author.

Don’t Forget Fall Landscape Maintenance (Excerpted from the Home Landscaping Guide for Lake Tahoe and Vicinity)


- Good fall garden cleanup is the best way to prevent disease and insect problems next year.

- Fertilize and plant – Ornamental plants will benefit from light fertilization after they go dormant. This encourages healthy root production. This is also a good time to plant trees, shrubs and perennials.

- What to prune – Prune evergreen trees and shrubs, and summer flowering deciduous plants if needed.

- Protect your plants for winter – Mulch plants to conserve moisture. Protect all plants from heavy snow coming off roofs, decks and driveways.

- Prepare garden equipment for winter storage.

- Keep garden records – This helps you plan next year’s garden.

last modified: October 14 2002