On November 16, 2020, Chuck Birdsong installed a starter coupler that helped join one pipe to another so that water from the Tuolumne River could be pumped from the Rodoni property to the Rairden property on leased ground also known as the AB La Grange Ranch. Both properties are along Highway 132, a few miles west of La Grange and just over twelve miles east of Waterford in the southeastern corner of Stanislaus County. The Tuolumne River borders the south edge of both properties.

At least four other men were involved in installing the pipe and irrigation system. The pump along the river is 24 horsepower, 480 volts, operates at 1800 revolutions per minute and can deliver 3400 gallons per minute. It’s located on a 50 acre parcel.

All the information above is from Todd Sill’s journal. Readers of recent stories will remember Mr. Sill as the person who contradicted Larry Byrd’s claim on July 8 that he pumps “almost daily and sometimes daily” from two deep wells on the AB La Grange Ranch.

When asked how often those same deep well pumps operated during the seven years he worked for Larry Byrd, Todd Sill said, “Seldom.”

He confirmed that statement from his journal records. The leased property — AB La Grange Ranch — also known as the Rodoni/Rairden properties — is under the same ownership as the properties where the pipes were joined.

Larry Byrd is a member of the Board of Directors for the Modesto Irrigation District (MID). Chuck Birdsong works as a ditch tender for MID. He’s the ditch tender for the MID canal that runs through the AB La Grange Ranch property across the highway from where the pipes were joined. That AB Ranch has become the focus of an investigation into Byrd’s irrigation practices for approximately 500 acres of almonds. Over 100 acres of those almonds are outside of MID boundaries.

Director Byrd has described Todd Sill as a “disgruntled employee.” It’s an odd statement because Sill would have never become involved in the irrigation controversy had not Linda Santos raised the issue of Byrd’s pumping (or not) on July 8 of this year. Santos wondered how Byrd’s over one-hundred acres of out-of-district trees were watered. Santos is a former member of the Oakdale Irrigation District Board of Directors.

Larry Byrd’s claims that the trees were watered from “deep wells” surprised the many people he had told over the years that he didn’t pump groundwater because all his trees were on MID surface water. Some of those people became curious about the July 8 contradictory statements.

When I found out Byrd had a long history of claims about not needing groundwater for his trees, I decided to investigate. One of the people I interviewed was Todd Sill. That was some thirty months after Sill left the AB La Grange. Seems like if he were “disgruntled” he’d have said so long before I talked with him.

I’ve kept in touch with Todd Sill ever since that first interview. Sometime in the last few weeks, Todd asked me whether I knew anything about riparian water law. I didn’t and said so.

Todd told me he’d been wondering whether is “okay” to transfer river water from one property to another. I said I doubted it was because if that were the case, the rivers would have run dry long ago.

That’s when Todd said he knew of a case when someone had run river water from one property to another. That’s how I learned about the Rodoni/Rairden (aka AB La Grange) riparian water transfer.

Having no knowledge about the issue, I asked people at Tuolumne River Trust and Friends of the River about riparian water law. They referred me to the California Department of Water Resources Control Board (WRCB) website. I also checked a few other sites for reviews of California Riparian Water Law. There was one consistent principle throughout:

“A riparian right exists on the smallest piece of land that touches a water source. If riparian land is subdivided so that some parts of the land do not touch the water, those lands will lose their riparian rights unless steps are taken to preserve them when the subdivision takes place. Riparian rights that attach to a small parcel cannot be used on adjacent parcels, even if those parcels touch the riparian parcel. Water obtained through a riparian right must be used on the parcel connected to the riparian right.” (WRCB)

In the case of the pipe Todd Sill asked me about, riparian water crossed both property and parcel lines. The water was pumped onto ground that does not touch the river. The pump involved was on a part of the property Larry Byrd leases with his partners at AB La Grange Ranch.

After ascertaining that riparian law almost never permits exceptions to the rules about crossing parcel and property lines, I asked Director Byrd via email whether he had an exemption or permit to pump riparian water from one parcel or property to another.

Director Byrd replied that the ground in question, consisting of three parcels on the Rairden property, has had riparian rights since the 1930s. He also admitted he irrigates that property with the pump that is on the Rodoni property.

Convinced that something had to be amiss, I informed Director Byrd that unless he could produce a permit or exemption that authorized the use of riparian water across property and parcel lines, I would have to file a complaint to the WRCB. I pointed out that riparian rights for the Rairden property are irrelevant to pumping river water from the Rodoni to the Rairden.

I have not heard from Director Byrd since then.

Larry Byrd’s silence on the riparian pumping issue is almost identical to his silence on the deep well issue. He has failed to produce pumping records for the deep wells Byrd says have irrigated over 100 acres of out-of-district almond trees for the last ten years. As a result, MID has begun an investigation into Director Byrd’s pumping practices.

Seems like now there will have to be another investigation into his pumping practices, this time concerning riparian water he’s pumping from a 50 acre parcel onto a 90 acre parcel. It’s even possible he’s delivering water to even more than 90 acres, as the Rairden property in question totals over 180 acres.

Sheesh.