By Alex Park and Julia Lurie Source: Huffington Post

This story originally appeared on Mother Jones and is reproduced here as part of the Climate Desk collaboration.

California, supplier of nearly half of all US fruits, veggies, and nuts, is on track to experience the driest year in the past half millennium. Farms use about 80 percent of the state’s “developed water,” or water that’s moved from its natural source to other areas via pipes and aqueducts.

As the maps above show, much of California’s agriculture is concentrated in the parts of the state that the drought has hit the hardest. For example: Monterey County, which is currently enduring an “exceptional drought,” according to the US Drought Monitor, grew nearly half of America’s lettuce and broccoli in 2012.

When it comes to water use, not all plants are created equal. Here’s how much water some of California’s major crops require:

Read full article at Huffington Post