In deep-red corner of Arizona, threat of losing water starts to outweigh fear of regulation

Driving along county roads that are little more than dirt paths, Tim Walsh remarked that the expansive valley below the Long Mountain range used to be no more than tumbleweeds and scraggly cactuses.

Now, it’s pistachio trees as far as the eye can see.

Far from mature, the pistachio saplings are just a few feet tall. The trees were planted for “miles and miles, clear up to the base of the mountain,” said Walsh, a lifelong Kingman resident and head of Mohave County’s Department of Development Services.

Over the past...