Help for Steelhead Trout

In keeping with the ongoing effort to remove barriers that keep salmon and steelhead from their spawning grounds, the Conservancy approved $971,800 for projects in Santa Barbara and Santa Cruz Counties in April. Two historically important steelhead trout runs along California's central coast will get a boost from the Coastal Conservancy grants.

The Cachuma Conservation Release Board will use its $371,800 to build a new bridge over Quiota Creek, a main tributary of the lower Santa Ynez River that is considered to be critical habitat for the watershed's remnant population of endangered southern steelhead trout, and to restore the stream channel to natural conditions. The Santa Ynez River, which drains the mountains north of Santa Barbara and enters the Pacific near Lompoc, once supported one of the largest runs of steelhead trout in southern California.

Construction of the Bradbury Dam in the 1950s closed off spawning habitat in the river's upper watershed, forcing steelhead to rely on tributaries in the lower watershed, such as Quiota Creek. The new bridge will replace a road crossing that is the most significant barrier keeping the fish from the creek's upper reach. The conservation release board plans to remove or modify the remaining eight barriers by 2010.

Santa Cruz County will use its $600,000 from the Conservancy to reconstruct a failed fish ladder and retrofit a culvert on Valencia Creek, opening the way to about five miles of steelhead spawning habitat. Valencia Creek is the principal tributary to Aptos Creek, which enters Monterey Bay about five miles east of the city of Santa Cruz.

These two projects are among 24 environmental restoration projects being conducted this year through the Integrated Watershed Restoration Program for Santa Cruz County, aimed at improving wildlife habitat and water quality by means of a voluntary, non-regulatory approach. The Conservancy helped develop the program and provided $4.5 million to get it started in 2003.

Lower Ventura River Habitat Study

The Conservancy approved $100,000 to the nonprofit Santa Barbara ChannelKeeper for monitoring water quality in the Lower Ventura River watershed and conducting studies needed to prepare a comprehensive restoration strategy.

Volunteers from Ventura Stream Team, a partnership between Channelkeeper and the Ventura Chapter of the Surfrider Foundation, have been monitoring water quality in the watershed for the last five years, providing baseline information for the stream studies to be undertaken using Conservancy funds. The project will also identify and prioritize potential restoration sites such as barriers to southern California steelhead passage, eroded stream banks, invasive vegetation, trash dumps, and pollution sources.

The biggest change in the watershed in many decades will come with the projected removal of Matilija Dam (see Coast & Ocean, Winter 2005-06), which will allow steelhead to return to their historic spawning grounds and will also restore sediment transport to the lower reaches of the river and to beaches. Much of the river corridor retains intact riparian woodlands, and the watershed supports great biological diversity, including more than 300 species of vertebrates, at least 26 of special status, including steelhead, tidewater goby, California red-legged frog, least Bell's vireo, peregrine falcon, black-shouldered kite, and California condor.