So earlier this week a federal fisheries agency---it's unclear which one, and there are several---told the California branch of the Bureau of Reclamation (another water agency) that the fish needed more water to get out to the Pacific. The bureau in turn passed the order to the South San Joaquin Irrigation District, telling them to let a pulse of water through the dam on the Stanislaus.

But upon receipt, Jeff Shields, the manager of SSJID went rogue: "Whose water will be released down the Stanislaus River to satisfy the second pulse flow?" Not his, in other words.