Colorado River Delta

and ana simo gonzales sits in an outdoor kitchen singing traditional songs and reminiscing he looks out onto a dusty landscape of sand rock and shrubs but his steady eyes also gaze in word to a time more than half a century ago this time of year the plant all the booming everything smell wonderful where lots of water everywhere there was a lot to eat the seventy year old gonzalez is tribal chief of the native broke apart people in northern baja he says before the united states and dammed the colorado river there were lashed woodlands here many dear as well as vast wetlands filled with fish and birds now everything is dry the un what is the only thing on the boulders are treated us are the only things survive year gonzalez says he just can't understand it how could the united states take almost all of the water from the colorado river without considering how it would ruin the delta and the cook a pot people fishing used to be at the center of cook up our

life but all of the fish native to the river have died out and many the fisheries in the upper gulf of california are in steep decline over fishing is partly to blame but the mexican government also thinks lack of freshwater is a big part of the problem to save the fish the government has banned much of the fishing around the delta gonzales says mexican fisherman are so poor they often ignore the prohibition one of one of the government's saying no more fishing is like someone cutting off our heads but as big as the us dams are they can't always hold back the full us share of the river ninety percent in recent years after big rain falls the reservoir is filled up and the united states had to let excess water flowed down river to mexico is overflow and other flukes have led to a small revival of nature in pockets of the delta it's about thirty miles southeast of those silences village

biologist was that ennobles navigates a canoe through a large margin build the launch pad yellow headed black birds are perched atop a tall plants and marshland and then met this afternoon searching for firms that are seldom scene because they live in dense thickets of agitation because they are where to locate their parents called yuma clapper rail in a lot of places recording hey responded favorably station or they're looking for an eighth floor they'll lose bone picker state alone over the competing because they think the movie and made fun of those they shined birds are slim they're literally thing at the rails carefully pressed by these allowances for you think of the plant without creating a stir their endangered involved the us and that's only about six hundred yuma clapper rails remain in the

us between four and six thousand live in how does he ended up in santa clara thin and now thanks to a large flap of fadhil swaying in the breeze that when we hear the unusual that gives the abundance of unified theory tells you know this is an exemplary restoration even though it happened by accident the march was created when farmers in arizona began dumping water too salty for agriculture into the sonora desert in a hostess says this unit that is restoring more water to the delta would help preserve many species that live on beau all the sides of the border area water will make a huge difference to fraud even just one percent oh no american environmental groups and the

mexican government of the united states will let more water flow into mexico for one thing the washington dc based defenders of wildlife the leaves that because a significant number of delta species are also endangered in the united states the us has an obligation to help protect them in mexico but so far their case has been rejected by us courts mexico's secretary for the environment be going lifting their says his country would be willing to guarantee that additional water would go to the environment we need that water for preserving and also for making sure that the water in one of the court about a reader finishes in the gulf and we are we are we have been trying to talk to the united states about that for a long time without the news sports with every word but the us government says the issue was settled in nineteen forty four when a treaty between the two countries divvied up the river and gave mexico ten percent then it really the interior department's top water official says

additional water for the delta should come from mexico's share constraining reality refining reality is that the united states share colorado river is completely allocated and pose for three jazz that was just one percent so what they're really talking about is taking away significant quantities of water from either arizona california or nebraska four years of drought along the river have left us a water agencies scrambling after every drop so it's not only unlikely the delta will get more water it's likely it will get less arizona is looking to de sela nate the salty wastewater that now sustains the scene about and also though you know horses says the us has drained its reservoir so low it could be years before the delta gets any spillover one of them the next few years

is that there's a dry riverbed here saw all of that has been restored following my business again we don't do something about that as the sun begins to set you know what the center of the march ms steel boat slide over gentle currents and murmur through this still retain water then he stops and listens to the music of mr that involvement in northern mexico's vicencio re kpcc up to him