A simple thing like water, or the lack of it, can lead to surprising stories.

Ezra Romero, a reporter and producer for Central California NPR station KVPR, has been reporting on the drought for the last few months.

In March, Romero decided to start using Instagram as another layer in his drought coverage.

He started posting storytelling pictures with the hashtag #DroughtVoices and encouraged people to post their own stories, too.

The Instagram project has been turned into a blog and now even a gallery show that opens tonight at Metro Galleries in Bakersfield.

Romero said the most surprising thing he's found is how complicated of an issue water is in the Central Valley.

"There is no easy answer when mother nature is in control and you live in a region of the country that is a desert that man has dug a bunch of holes in," he wrote to us by e-mail.

The drought has set off chain reactions of unexpected events.

For example, Romero did a piece on how the drought has led to more fallowing fields, which led to more squirrels. The squirrels attracted more predatory birds, which in turn got in the way of fighter jets at the nearby Lemoore Naval Air Station.

One of the most unusual pictures in Romero's series is of a bunch of microphones strapped together in the middle of an empty field. It was taken before a press conference with House Speaker John Boehner.

"It was kind of funny, all these well-dressed reporters waiting a mile outside of Bakersfield dirtying their Dockers while facing the sun," he wrote.

Ezra Romero says the series is ongoing, "just like the drought is here to stay."

He hopes to continue to receive more submissions from all over California.

Follow the #DroughtVoices project by following Ezra Romero on Instagram at @ezraromero.

See his photographs in-person tonight from 5 to 9 p.m. at Metro Galleries in downtown Bakersfield.