Ecosystem Service

When the email came that said we were meeting at the Watershed I thought it was a shed to hold water and remember thinking "Well that will look interesting.  Maybe a big aquarium of just water."  Turns out I was very wrong.  It is an interactive building to learn about the watershed.  What is a watershed you ask?  It is a system of tributaries and sub tributaries that feed into the main river in your city.  In Boise's case it is the Boise River Watershed.  It is used to feed the city it's water supply.  This water supply is used for many different areas.  It is used in preservation, hydropower, for fish and wildlife, supplying water for our livestock and irrigation, giving us humans water to drink and use around the house, fishing, boating, sightseeing, transporting goods and for pools and fountains and of course keeping those lovely grass areas green.  This is what is meant by ecosystem services.  

The questions was posed "what ecosystem service do you value the most in your watershed?" and I really had to think about that.  You don't realize how much you use water in a day!  There is the obvious use of drinking water and if we are being honest that is the most valuable one to staying alive and staying cool on a hot summers day.  But you also need the water to provide power, water crops so we can eat, keep the fish and livestock alive to provide meat, and really just enjoy the outdoors.  Some of the things Boise habitants like to do most is backpacking to different lakes or bringing their boats to Lucky Peak or floating the Boise River.  Just yesterday I had a BBQ and had friends over and we played yard games on the lawn that I water with the water from the Watershed.  Though that should be one of the last resource we use with our water it is one of the more enjoyable ones we get to use.  It's hard to say what ecosystem service (benefit from natural resource) I value the most because they all have a part to play for our community, for our households and for the Earth.  I will say I will try to value them all so we will get to enjoy them all for many years to come.  I mean we don't want to end up like Southern California where they are in a big draught and everyone has to severly restrict their water use.

So I'll pose this question to you.  What can we do to make sure we get to use these valuable resources our ecosystem is providing for us for a long time?