When President Trump sent his first tweet about the current California wildfires, which have killed nine people and destroyed more than 1,000 homes, he chose the moment to zero in on water policy — leaving some scratching their heads. 
 
 “California wildfires are being magnified & made so much worse by the bad environmental laws which aren’t allowing massive amount of readily available water to be properly utilized,” he tweeted Sunday. “It is being diverted into the Pacific Ocean. Must also tree clear to stop fire spreading!” 
 
 California wildfires are being magnified & made so much worse by the bad environmental laws which aren’t allowing massive amount of readily available water to be properly utilized. It is being diverted into the Pacific Ocean. Must also tree clear to stop fire spreading! — Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) August 5, 2018 
 
 Asked whether firefighters at the Carr and Mendocino Complex fires are short on water, California Department of Forestry and Fire Protection spokeswoman Lynette Round replied, “Not that I’m aware of. ... but that doesn’t mean it’s not happening.” 
 
 But the tweet had LeRoy Westerling, a UC Merced professor specializing in wildfire and climatology, chuckling. 
 
 Now Playing: 
 
 “On the water side, it boggles the mind,” he said. “We do manage all of our rivers in California, and all the water is allocated many times over. So I’m not sure what he was recommending. 
 
 “Even if we eliminated all habitat for riparian species and fish, and allowed saltwater intrusion into the delta and set up a sprinkler system over the state, that wouldn’t compensate for greater moisture loss from climate change.” 
 
 Westerling said his version of a tweet explaining the severity of the wildfires would read: “Ongoing warming and accelerated climate change are driving unpredictable increases and extreme fire in California across a wide range of ecosystems.” 
 
 Jonathan Kauffman is a San Francisco Chronicle staff writer. Email: jkauffman@sfchronicle.com. Twitter: @jonkauffman ||||| President Trump Donald John TrumpSouth Korea urges Pyongyang to speed up denuclearization process More than a dozen arrested as protesters, counter-protesters clash in Berkeley Trump golfs with Graham at New Jersey club MORE appeared on Sunday to place blame for massive wildfires in California on the state's environmental laws, including its water and forest management policies, saying that such regulations have made the blazes "so much worse." 
 
 "California wildfires are being magnified & made so much worse by the bad environmental laws which aren’t allowing massive amount of readily available water to be properly utilized," Trump tweeted. "It is being diverted into the Pacific Ocean. Must also tree clear to stop fire spreading!" 
 
 California wildfires are being magnified & made so much worse by the bad environmental laws which aren’t allowing massive amount of readily available water to be properly utilized. It is being diverted into the Pacific Ocean. Must also tree clear to stop fire spreading! — Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) August 5, 2018 
 
 ADVERTISEMENT 
 
 The president's tweet comes as California continues to face a series of wildfires that have destroyed buildings, homes and left several people dead. 
 
 California has seen a spate of highly destructive wildfires in recent years. Fueling those fires, in part, has been a buildup of vegetation in the state, along with long droughts that dried up that vegetation. ||||| Tweet with a location 
 
 You can add location information to your Tweets, such as your city or precise location, from the web and via third-party applications. You always have the option to delete your Tweet location history. Learn more ||||| As wildfires continued to scorch California, President Donald Trump on Sunday issued a tweet that befuddled experts, wrongly blaming the state’s water diversions for making the blazes worse. 
 
 California’s environmental laws, he claimed, “aren’t allowing massive amount of readily available water to be properly utilized. It is being diverted into the Pacific Ocean. Must also tree clear to stop fire spreading!” 
 
 While decades-old state and federal forest management strategies have been cited as exacerbating California’s wildfires in recent years, experts Sunday were quick to refute Trump’s claim that water policy was to blame. 
 
 While California’s river water is tightly managed to account for drinking, agriculture and environmental needs, it is not being diverted into the ocean. And the problem is not that the state lacks the water to fight fires, but that years of drought have made forests and brush more flammable. 
 
 “On the water side, it boggles the mind,” UC Merced professor and wildfire specialist LeRoy Westerling told the San Francisco Chronicle. “We do manage all of our rivers in California, and all the water is allocated many times over. So I’m not sure what he was recommending. . . . Even if we eliminated all habitat for riparian species and fish, and allowed saltwater intrusion into the delta and set up a sprinkler system over the state, that wouldn’t compensate for greater moisture loss from climate change.” 
 
 Meanwhile, the Trump administration on Sunday approved a federal disaster declaration for the state. Nine people have been killed by the 18 wildfires currently burning across the state. The Mendocino Complex fire north of San Francisco has grown to the fifth-largest in state history, burning almost 400 square miles by Sunday. and threatening 15,000 homes. Meanwhile, the Ferguson fire entered Yosemite National Park, which remained largely closed to visitors, and the Carr fire near Redding claimed its seventh life, when a PG&E lineman crashed his vehicle while working with crews to fight the blaze. Overall, more than 470,000 acres have burned in the state, with more than 14,000 firefighters on the front lines.
– President Trump on Sunday addressed the devastation wrought by the latest California wildfires, the Hill reports. "California wildfires are being magnified & made so much worse by the bad environmental laws which aren't allowing massive amount of readily available water to be properly utilized," he tweeted. "It is being diverted into the Pacific Ocean. Must also tree clear to stop fire spreading!" But MarketWatch says his tweet "befuddled experts," noting that the state's water supply and how it's used isn't to blame for worsening blazes. For one, the water isn't being dumped into the Pacific, and firefighters do appear to have plenty of water, per a California Department of Forestry and Fire Protection rep—but trees and brush have become more flammable due to the state's years-long drought. "We do manage all of our rivers in California, and all the water is allocated many times over," wildfire expert LeRoy Westerling tells the San Francisco Chronicle. "So I'm not sure what [Trump] was recommending. … It boggles the mind." Westerling points the blame for making the fires worse at "ongoing warming and accelerated climate change."