crazy amount of water for the output. Olives too, I think. Heck, I remember a comedian years ago in his routine saying that only Californians are arrogant enough to grow rice in a desert. And another stat from the past saying that something like 1/4 of all US produce comes from California. But it's also the boom / bust nature of the weather they've been getting. A multi year drought parches the ground, and then they get a deluge that can't soak in to replenish the aquifers because really dry ground isn't absorbent. The rain just runs off and then the rivers that they do have there run strong for awhile and empty into the ocean.