As the sprinklers ran across the lush lettuce, heirloom tomatoes and bright green herbs, it seemed like any other cool and crisp January night at the Venice Community Garden. 

Families stopped by earlier that day to tend to their own plants and chatted with neighbors about what vegetables to plant in the spring. 

Small popsicle-stick signs indicated what budding herb was peaking it's way out of the moist soil. 

Four months later, the lot now sits vacant, with layers of dust coating the withering plants. A “FOR SALE” sign stuck in the dry, cracked ground stands where the "BASIL" popsicle stick used to stand tall. 

After California received record low rainfall in 2013, even the smallest gardens could not escape the grasp of the “megadrought.” On average, California receives approximately 20 inches of rain a year. In 2013, California received only about four inches according to the California Department of Food and Agriculture (CDFA.)

“The drought is affecting everyone. Our once flourishing gardens and farms are becoming ghost towns,” explained Nate Siemens of Fat Uncle Farms at the Mar Vista Farmer’s Market said.

Gov. Jerry Brown’s emergency call to action to conserve water across California has lead to multiple experimental solutions with the hope to bring water to the people who need it most. 

An agricultural well that provides pipe irrigation underneath crops is one solution to the problem for farmers who can afford to install the irrigation system, which requires a permit from the State of California’s Environmental Health division and at least $400,000 out of pocket. 

Sam McFarlin at the Cliff McFarlin Farm stand at the Mar Vista Farmer’s market explained that his ranch is grateful to have had agricultural wells since his family started its business years ago. 

McFarlin Farm is a ranch farm and all of their produce is on trees, so they have always had this system due to trees requiring more water than vegetables. “Because the wells are crazy expensive and in such high demand, we are very lucky to have ours [agriculture wells] right now,” McFarlin, who runs the farm, said. 

To add to the stress, federal officials announced in late February that the Central Valley Project will no longer provide water for Central Valley farmers. As California’s largest water delivery system, the project also has cut 50 percent of its contracts to provide water in urban areas, according to the CDFA. 

“You know, it’s a cyclical problem like anything. We lose water, we lose our products and we lose our business,” Siemens said. As the third-generation owner of Fat Uncle Farms, Siemens knows how important it is to fight the drought that is hurting Fat Uncle’s number one product: almonds. 

“We strive to do it the way my grandfather farmed his almonds, hand-picked right off our orchard,” Siemens said. Although Siemens remains optimistic, the soaking of the almonds overnight to maintain their nutrients requires gallons of water therefore less water is available to irrigate the fields. “As of right now, we are lucky to be sharing (an agricultural) well with a neighboring farm. But we’ll see how the rest of year goes,” Siemens said.  

With California supplying over 82 percent of the world’s almonds in the past year, the drought not only has farmers worried but also investors clenching their wallets. 

As the state’s second most valuable crop, with sales at $4.35 billion in 2012, almonds inevitably will have an economic downfall in the next few years because thousands of acres will not be planted this year due to decreased rainfall according to the CDFA. 

Alex’s Fruit and Nuts of the Westwood Farmer’s Market specializes in almonds. The farm has tried to do its best to prepare for the short supply in the next year. They have raised their prices of their almonds a dollar more and started to sell different varieties of cheaper nuts that are easier to produce such as sunflower seeds and pepitas with new spice rubs according to a farm employee.

Other businesses that have been affected by the drought are fresh, pressed juice companies that offer expensive juice cleanses. Many juice vendors source their produce straight from vegetable and fruit farms. 

Juice Served Here (JSH), a Culver City based pressed juice company prides themselves by only sourcing from small, family farms that grow and cultivate their crops in small batches. 

“We want to help the local, three-generation family farms who stick to the tried and true. And during the drought, it’s the small steps that make the fruits and veggies taste that much better,” said Alicia , an in-store juicer at the Bikram Yoga studio in Marina Del Rey, one of JSH’s eight locations in Southern California.  

JSH has been able to combat the drought by only sourcing from farms that practice Biodynamic Agriculture. This alternative farming approach is more sustainable than traditional organic farming because it is more energy efficient and resilient to climate change and environmental challenges according the JSH website. 

JSH sources avocados, apples and berries from the Stehley Family Organics farm that is completely self-sufficient due to the solar panels that the line the fields and the farm’s water supply from two reservoirs located privately on their land according to the JSH website. 

Although restaurants cannot house privately owned reservoirs for their water supply, many farm to table eateries have followed the trend to source from self-sustaining farms. This movement has now lead to self-sustaining gardens at restaurants themselves. 

Found at Petco and Whole Foods, Aquaponics is finding its way to restaurants’ kitchens and greenhouses across California. Described as a sustainable farming system that combines aquaculture and hydroponics, these plant producing tanks might be the future of farming according to the Back to Roots website (B2R). Fish swim in a small tank underneath a garden that can grow everything from lettuce to herbs to tomatoes. 

This cyclical process uses bacteria from the fish to feed the plants and ultimately clean and recycle the water according to B2R. 

“This system is self-efficient and healthy for both the fish and the plants you are growing,” Connor Dushane, a geologist and Aquaponics entrepreneur, said. “We use 90 percent less water than traditional farming, and that is why the use of this system is starting to spread fast within restaurants and at farms on a larger scale.” The size of the tank ranges from a small countertop system to a full irrigation system in greenhouses and farms according to Dushane. The cost varies on the size of the aquafarm but individual tanks are sold for approximately $60.00 dollars. 

Currently, there is a SoCal Aquaponics greenhouse that produces vegetables located East of Los Angeles and multiple Urth Caffe locations are experimenting with the portable tank systems according to an Urth Caffe employee.  

Although these alternative solutions are helping currently, this crisis is forecasted to last for awhile therefore attracting necessary government action. Besides a visit to some of California’s farms from President Barack Obama, the U.S. Bureau of Reclamation and the Natural Resources Conservation Service donated $14 million for water management improvements to California, along with Agriculture Secretary Tom Vilsack’s $20 million. 

Along with the California Restaurant Association, the Los Angeles Department of Water and Power (LADWP) proposed to restaurants earlier this year to conserve water by only serving water upon customers request. The LADWP has had conservation acts since 2009 including limitations on outdoor watering (three days a week, assigned to odd / even addresses, prohibitions on runoff into streets and gutters from excessive watering) according to the Association of California Water Agencies. 

The Agricultural Act of 2014 was passed on February 7 to address not only agricultural and food policies but also water conservation laws and funding for new irrigation systems according to the United States Department of Agriculture. 

In late March, the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration’s Climate Prediction Center activated its alert system to issue an El Nino watch in early Fall of this year and through 2015. Although it is early to predict exactly, the El Nino is expected to bring wetter weather and rainfall to most of California, but nothing is guaranteed. Even with negative consequences such as hurricanes, landslides and floods, the El Nino seems to be welcomed with open-arms from desperate farmers, restaurateurs and investors spanning all of California. 

The outcome of this year’s farming season will decide what farms will stay open and which ones will have to pull up their roots. “Talk to me in a year and I’ll give you the answer, I hope it’s a good one,” said Siemens.