An acre-foot equals 326,000 gallons. Metropolitan probably will buy an extra 80,000 acre feet, instead of 150,000. The rains were so good to one Alameda water district, which was ready to implement rationing, that it has enough water to meet its needs through the dry summer. Matt Colwell, manager of a water district near Chico, said plans to take acreage out of production have been scaled back dramatically. Growers there may idle 4,000 acres, which would free as much as 15,000 acre feet of water for sale, he said.
Growers see water sales as a way to offset mounting losses in a depressed economic climate.
It's not just the rice that's in trouble. Tomato prices were cut in half last year. Yuba County farmers have offered to sell 50,000 acre feet, but they will irrigate crops with groundwater rather than fallow, said Curt Aikens, a water agency manager.