Sea and Sage Audubon’s annual barbecue has become a summer staple over the years that certainly doesn’t disappoint. After all, where is there a better place to enjoy repast under the stars while listening to an engaging speaker?

The barbecue is scheduled for Saturday, July 29, from 5-10 p.m. The evening program will feature Miguel Ordenana, who will speak on citizen science and his mammal research project at Griffith Park. Ordenana is a native of Los Angeles, who grew up near Griffith Park. He describes himself as “passionate about carnivores” and engaged in a study to determine whether urban carnivores and deer can enter and exit Griffith Park via corridors, or if the park is an island surrounded by a sea of urban development.

During the presentation, participants will enjoy chicken and freshly grilled hot dogs, salad, beans, chips, fresh fruit, cake, lemonade, and coffee. A veggie wrap will be provided for those who specifically request it on their reservation forms. The event is staffed entirely by Sea and Sage volunteers.

This family event will feature something for everyone:

• Dining in the meadow (6-7 p.m.)
• A sale of used nature books (5-7:15 p.m.)
• Evening walks around the marsh after dinner (6:30-7:50 p.m.)
• The citizen science and mammal research program (starts at 8:15 p.m.)

This event sells out fast, so reservations are a must. Tickets for the barbecue and program are $20 for adults and $7 for children under five. Tickets include meals and beverages, evening marsh walk and program. Activities will begin at 5 p.m. Sign-up sheets for the night wildlife walk after the program will be available at the welcome table.

For more information, reservations, and directions, call Sea and Sage Audubon at (949) 261-7963, or visit the Sea and Sage website. The marsh is a hidden oasis located in the heart of Irvine. For more information on the Marsh, please visit the IRWD website.

Four Irvine Unified School District students were honored at the June 12 Board meeting for their water-related science fair projects.

The students were presented with certificates and each of their schools will receive $100 on their behalf for science programs, with an additional $100 going to support the district science fair.

IRWD has supported the science fair since its inception. In the fall, IRWD professionals participate in Ask-a-Scientist Night, which offers the students the opportunity to get their questions answered about their prospective projects.

This year’s science fair was held at Portola High School, the school district’s newest facility. IRWD Water Quality experts Jessica Tron, David Cole and Mindy Bergen judged more than 35 water-related projects based on the use of the scientific method, creativity, and relevance, completeness of the project and evidence of problem solving.

This year’s winners:

Ainesh Arumugan, grade 10, University High School, “Low-Cost Smart Controller for Optimum Irrigation and Fertilization” This was Ainesh’s second appearance for a science fair honor in which he was recognized for his first smart irrigation controller project. In this version, Ainesh added the fertilizer component. He set out to develop a smart irrigation system that would be able to determine the health of the plants, differentiate between moisture stress and nutrient deficiency, check the weather and set a watering schedule that would best help the plants while conserving water. Ainesh built his device and accomplished his goal. Not only did he win an honorable mention at the county science fair and a senior division award from Engineers Without Borders, but he has a patent pending on his controller.

Aurnov Chattopadhyay, grade 12, University High School, “Efficient Removal of Pb2+, CD2+ and UO2+ from Water”

Aurnov was inspired by the lead crisis in Flint, Michigan water. He cites findings by the World Health Organization that four heavy metals – lead, cadmium, arsenic and mercury among the 10 most dangerous chemicals by public concern. Aurnov wanted to find an effective, but inexpensive method for removing these constituents from water. In his study, he used sustainable nanofiber coagulants synthesized to remove the metals from the water. His experiment was successful and found that one-step modification is a pragmatic solution to heavy metal pollution because coagulation using one-step modified nanofibers is environmentally friendly, economic and efficient. Aurnov’s project won a first place in the senior division at the county science fair. He also won an award from the National Water Research Institute in the senior division and was an Intel Finalist. His project was on display at the International Science Fair in May.

Sabreen Alam, grade 7, Jeffrey Trails Middle School, “Mediated vs. Unmediated Microbral Fuel Cells”

Sabreen set out to answer the question of how does a mediator in a microbial fuel cell affect the amount of energy produced by the microbes in a mud sample from a low-order stream, lake or soil sample. She took mud samples from her backyard, the San Joaquin Marsh, Irvine Lake and San Diego Creek. Her hypothesis stated that the mud samples from the Marsh would generate the most amount of energy in a shorter time because it came from the most ideal ecosystem. Her experiment validated her hypothesis, finding that the microbes in the marsh mud did indeed produce the greatest amount of energy. Sabreen’s project won an honorable mention at the county science fair and was on display at the STEAM Fair at the Great Park.

Aditi Mundra, grade 6, Canyon View Elementary, “Solar Desalination-Does Temperature vs. Time of Day Affect the Amount of water purified?”

Adidi hypothesized that the salt water would purify the most at noon because that’s when the sun’s rays are the strongest. She said the water would purify the second most at 9 a.m. because the sun is just coming up and gaining energy. She said the water would purify the least at 3 p.m. because the sun is going down and heat is decreasing. In her experiment, she turned salt water into pure water using solar energy and measured the quantity in two hours. The results showed that more water was purified at 9 a.m. than her hypothesis of noon. She tried her experiment several times and each time, the period between 9-11 a.m. had the highest amount of drinkable water. Aditi’s project was selected for participation at the county science fair.

An Irvine student is one of the grand prize winners of the Annual Water Awareness Poster Contest sponsored by the Municipal Water District of Orange County. This year’s theme was “Finding Water.”

Ruoying Li, a ninth-grade student at Tarbut V’Torah, took the grand prize for her age category. Her artwork was a dramatic hourglass: bright and colorful on top but arid and bleak at the bottom.

Li won an iPad mini for taking her category. Judging was conducted publicly online, with more than 1,700 votes cast among all of the entries.

More than 1,000 entries were received from students in grades one through 12 throughout Orange County.

Thirteen more students in the IRWD service area received honors from MWDOC:

Sarah Alkatib, grade 5, Stonegate Elementary School
Evelyn Bekker, grade 4, Santiago Hills Elementary School
Alex Brucher, grade 6, Westpark Elementary School
Lisa Cho, grade 4, University Park Elementary School
Raunak Das, grade 1, Portola Springs Elementary School
Macy Gaudiano, grade 2, Alderwood Elementary School
Isabella Jew, grade 2, College Park Elementary School
Francis Kim, grade 1, Woodbury Elementary School
Shivani Kulkarni, grade 10, Northwood High School
Cara Anne Liao, grade 1, Turtle Rock Elementary School
Medha Mohankumar, grade 6, Aspire Art Studios
Sanjana Ramakrishnan, grade 6, Brywood Elementary School
Sean Yeap, grade 5, Aspire Art Studios

Congratulations to these student artists.

Summer is here and the heat is rising. When temperatures rise, the Irvine Ranch Water District operations staff remains in a constant state of readiness to respond to fires and/or loss of power in our service area.The water operations department routinely patrols and monitors the canyon areas. A Supervisory Control and Data Acquisition (SCADA) system is used to remotely monitor all aspects of pump station and reservoir operation. This system uses radio, phone lines and cellular telemetry units to relay information.

All of the pump stations serving the canyon areas are equipped with generators that provide power automatically in the event of a power outage. These generators are tested monthly to ensure proper operation. The fuel tanks are kept full, and the fuel is routinely filtered and sampled for quality. The automatic transfer switches, which direct generator power to pump stations, are inspected and tested annually.

IRWD has battled fire season before. In 2007, the Santiago Fire burned over 28,000 acres, most of which were in the IRWD service area. When the fire occurred, IRWD crews implemented emergency operations procedures and worked around the clock to keep the water flowing to firefighters by connecting emergency generators, operating pumps and manually measuring reservoir depths in areas where downed power lines disabled electronic monitoring systems. IRWD crews installed portable diesel tanks throughout the area to refuel the generators and installed remote communication devices to restore monitoring systems until phone lines became operational again. Due to these efforts, water service to firefighters and residents was maintained throughout the fire episode. After the fire, all sites were evaluated, resulting in improvements to several pump stations including the installation of block walls for added fire protection.

IRWD customers with homes in the foothill and canyon areas are encouraged to look into the benefits of maintaining fire resistant landscaping. The Orange County Fire Authority (OCFA) endorses planting shrubs such as monkeyflower and autumn sage as well as trees like the California sycamore and toyon. Learn more about these plants on the IRWD website.

Plant maintenance is also necessary for fire resistant plants to offer protection during a wildfire. Watch this video to view an OCFA guide on fire resistant plants. 

Bruce Newell, Senior Reserve Officer at OCFA Station 16 in Modjeska Canyon, also recommends visiting OCFA's website, ocfa.org. "We are currently in the READY stage," explains Newell. "It is the perfect time to clean up around any structure and make a good defensible space. A wonderful wet winter has produced tall grasses and other plants that are now drying out and must be removed or cut back. Warmer weather will soon heighten the risk of fire."

Another important thing for Canyon residents to do is to sign up for IRWD’s CodeRED system. Do not wait for an emergency to happen before you sign up for CodeRED, a high-volume, high-speed system for mass emergency notifications. Since 2010, IRWD has kept customers informed in times of water-related emergencies with CodeRED. Customers have the option of receiving voice, email or text messages within an hour of an emergency. Signing up for CodeRED is as easy as going to the IRWD website.