Along much of California’s coast, lack of streamflow – often caused by the diversion of water for human use – is a major impediment to recovery of salmon and steelhead. Trout Unlimited works with a diverse collection of partners on projects that improve dry season streamflow for the benefit of native coho and steelhead.
Water Rights Information
- SWIFT Working Group: A Practitioner’s Guide to Instream Flow Transactions in California
- Trout Unlimited: A Guide to California Water Rights for Small Water Users
- State Water Resources Control Board: Instream Flow Dedications
- Salmonid Restoration Federation: Guidance on Complying with California’s Water Laws – A Guide for Small Landowners in Coastal California
- Salmonid Restoration Federation: Water Rights Education
Partner Resources
- Russian River Coho Water Resources Partnership
- California Salmon and Steelhead Coalition
- Sanctuary Forest: Water Stewardship
- Scott River Water Trust
- Salmon Creek Water Conservation Program and Save Our Salmon Program
- Gold Ridge Resource Conservation District: Instream Flow Enhancement
- Marin Resource Conservation District: Pine Gulch Creek Water Rights and Watershed Restoration Project
- Salmonid Restoration Federation: The Redwood Creek Water Conservation Project
- San Mateo Resource Conservation District: 100 Ponds Project
- Sonoma Ecology Center: Streamflow Stewardship Program
- Porter Creek Streamflow Enhancement Project
Case studies
You Better Take Care of It: Helping Farmers Help Fish on Pescadero Creek
Pescadero Creek is one of the last, best wild steelhead strongholds on California’s Central Coast and is likely the best chance for recovering coho south of San Francisco. TU and conservation partners have worked for years to improve streamflows and habitat conditions in this watershed. TU’s work has focused on collaborative projects with willing agricultural landowners in the lower watershed that will improve water security for farming and boost streamflows in the dry season when steelhead need it most. The BJ Burns/Bianchi Flowers farm project illustrated here is a fine example of how this kind of partnership can benefit both fish and people.
Good Neighbors: Sharing Water with Steelhead on Little Arthur Creek
Little Arthur Creek provides the best remaining habitat for steelhead in the upper Pajaro River watershed. Trout Unlimited, CHEER, and CEMAR are working with residents along Little Arthur Creek to stop diverting water during the dry season by relying on stored water instead.
A Fan for the fish and the Martorana Family Winery
In Grape Creek, the Russian River Coho Partnership and Martorana Family Winery worked together to enable the family to use a fan instead of a water diversion to protect its vineyard from frost, leaving more water instream for coho and steelhead. The Partnership formed in 2009 to develop a systematic approach to improving streamflow and water supply reliability in five Russian River tributaries: Dutch Bill Creek, Green Valley Creek, Mark West Creek, Mill Creek, and Grape Creek. The Partnership is generously funded by the National Fish and Wildlife Foundation with additional support from the Sonoma County Water Agency. For more information, go to cohopartnership.org.
Water for Salmon, Water for School
The Mattole River is one of the most renowned steelhead fisheries in California but suffers from low flows due to increasing residential and agricultural demands. TU, Sanctuary Forest, and CEMAR developed a cooperative project with Whitethorn Elementary School to reduce the school’s diversion of water from the river during the dry season, while providing a stable source of water for the school year-round. The school now leverages the project as a learning opportunity for its students, who put their own delightful “spin” on issues of water, fish and nature in this short film.
Project fact sheets for download
- Mark West Creek Annual Monitoring Report WY2023
- Mill Creek Annual Monitoring Report WY2023
- Carmel River – Rancho Canada
- Pescadero Creek – Bianchi Flowers
- Projects to Increase Summer Streamflows in California
- Mark West Creek – Rancho Mark West
- Dutch Bill Creek – Westminster Woods
- San Gregorio Creek – Repetto
- Little Arthur Creek
- Russian River Coho Partnership – Flow Release
- Mattole River – Whitethorn School
- Upper Grape Creek
- Blue House Farm Project
- Blue Meadow Project
- Little Shasta Diversion Replacement and Fish Passage Improvement Projects
- Little Shasta Stockwater and Irrigation Efficiency Projects
- Porter Creek Streamflow Enhancement Project
- Trickle Fill Project
More Videos
- Russian River Coho Water Resources Partnership
- USFWS Restoration: Coho Salmon Return to Grape Creek
- Peninsula Open Space Trust (POST): Dealing with Drought: Farmers on the Coast
- San Mateo Resource Conservation District: Farmer Dave Repetto on Water Conservation
- NOAA: Restoring Salmon Creek
- Monterey Herald: Rancho Canada Project
- Morro Bay National Estuary Program: Fighting Against the Current: Keeping Steelhead in Morro Bay
Media
- Sonoma-Marin Farm News (January 2017): Stewards of the Salmon: Landowners apply creative solutions to benefit native fish
- Gilroy Dispatch (April 2016): New Way to Save the Fish
- Santa Rosa Press Democrat: Water added to Camp Meeker’s Dutch Bill Creek a ‘lifesaver’ for young fish
- Trout Unlimited blog: Steelhead restoration in Pennington Creek
Planning documents
- Mattole River Headwaters Streamflow Improvement Plan
- Grape Creek Streamflow Improvement Plan
- Mill Creek Streamflow Improvement Plan
- Dutch Bill Creek Streamflow Improvement Plan
- McBain and Trush Inc., Technical Memorandum: Streamflow Thresholds for Juvenile Salmonid Rearing Habitat in the Mattole Headwaters Southern Sub-Basin
- Report on Water Use in the Chorro Creek Watershed