habitat restoration – Enviro Updates

Op-Ed: Re-wilding Point Reyes could restore Northern CA coast’s natural state

June 27, 2026

Ken Bouley and Helen-Teri Shore, PRESS DEMOCRAT

Bringing back beavers, sea otters and other native wildlife to Point Reyes National Seashore could be a critical step in restoring the incredible coastal landscape to a more natural state after decades of commercial dairy farming and grazing. Now that most ranching is being phased out in the popular park, we have the opportunity to rewild about 17,000 acres of the coastal bluffs, wetlands, prairies and forests to improve watersheds and habitat, expand public access and strengthen tribal co-management.

Reintroducing absent native wildlife is not simply about bringing back charismatic animals. It is about restoring ecological relationships that evolved over thousands of years and were disrupted by colonization, habitat loss and overexploitation.

At least seven animals that are likely to have roamed these lands in the past and could do so in the future include: sea otter, beaver, pronghorn, Humboldt marten, fisher, North American porcupine and Douglas ground squirrel. A recent report by Dr. Richard Lanman and Alexis Evripidou for Turtle Island Restoration Network is the first to examine the potential for re-wilding the national seashore.

Marin County is notably the only coastal county north of the Golden Gate Bridge without wild beavers. Their return could transform local watersheds. Beaver dams create wetlands that store water, reduce erosion, improve drought resilience, enhance biodiversity and benefit native fish, including threatened salmon populations. As California faces increasing climate extremes, beavers offer a practical, nature-based restoration tool. Beavers are already reinvigorating watersheds in Sonoma County.

Sonoma Coast, Wildlifebeavers, habitat restoration, Point Reyes National Seashore, sea otters, tule elk

Green Valley revival reconnects creek to floodplain

November 20, 2025

Dewey Watson, SONOMA COUNTY GAZETTE

A partnership between Iron Horse Vineyards, the property owner, and the Gold Ridge Research Conservation District (Gold Ridge), with funding from California Fish and Wildlife and the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration Restoration Center (NOAA), has restored and improved a large part of the middle reach of Green Valley Creek to provide overwintering habitat for coho and steelhead salmon. Construction on the project, which took years of planning, began in April and has recently been completed.

“Now it is up to nature, assisted by teams of workers planting native grasses and willows to restore what has been lost for over a century and bring back healthy salmon to the creek and the Russian River,” said chief scientist and project manager John Green.

Green Valley Creek was once considered critical habitat for salmon because of its proximity to the Atascadero Plain, offering one of the largest basins for young salmon to grow strong enough to survive ocean challenges and return to breed.

This area of the creek, at the bottom of the Iron Horse vineyard property, was once a flat field, prone to annual flooding and quick drainage. It offered no shelter for fish or the insects that support them. Now, after years of planning and months of construction reshaping, the site hums with quiet anticipation as a stream begins to come back to life.

Habitats, Water, WildlifeCA Fish & Wildlife, coho salmon, Gold Ridge RCD, Green Valley Creek, habitat restoration, NOAA, Russian River, steelhead

CalTrout remains committed to salmon recovery efforts as commercial salmon fishing season is shut down again

April 16, 2025

CALTROUT

On April 15, 2025, officials announced a third consecutive closure of California’s commercial salmon fishery as Chinook salmon populations continue to struggle across the state. Limited windows for recreational fishing will be allowed on specific dates to ensure minimal impact on the salmon population. This season’s decision by the Pacific Fishery Management Council marks the most consecutive closures the state has ever seen, exemplifying how dire the crisis for California’s native salmon has become.

While this decision will help keep populations afloat, the closure has significant economic repercussions, affecting the commercial fishing industry, recreational charter operators, and communities reliant on salmon-related industries from Monterey to the Oregon border. Additionally, salmon hold cultural importance for Native American Tribes in California. Low salmon numbers directly impact many Californians’ way of life.

“A third year of closure is brutal for towns along the North and Central coasts that rely on anglers to fill hotels and restaurants during the season,” said Charlie Schneider, California Trout Lost Coast Project Manager. “While a short recreational season will keep hope alive for some anglers, it won’t do much to support the communities and economies that rely on these fish. We aren’t going to stop working for those folks.”

California’s salmon crisis is a result of long-term habitat degradation, water mismanagement, and compounding impacts from climate change. The staggering loss of these fish is part of a larger biodiversity crisis. CalTrout and UC Davis’ SOS II: State of the Salmonids report found that 45% of California’s native salmon, trout, and steelhead are at risk of going extinct in the next 50 years if current trends continue.

Sonoma Coast, Water, Wildlifedams, fisheries, habitat restoration, salmon season, water flows

Groups unite to replant Sonoma Coast kelp forest

July 23, 2024

Cole Hersey, NORTH BAY BOHEMIAN

This July marks the first summer planting of lab-grown bull kelp along specific sites on the Sonoma coast by the Greater Farallones Association and NOAA.

On a sunny afternoon just north of Bodega Bay, two large troughs of water bubbled in the sunlight, toward the ocean. Swirling in the eddy of bubbles were slimy forest green blades of kelp. Julieta Gomez, the Greater Farallones Association (GFA) kelp restoration specialist, explained that these were blades of lab-grown bull kelp, a tall brown algae that towers dozens of feet over rocky coastlines like a tree.

Bull kelp forests were once a common sight along beaches all across Marin and Sonoma counties. But over the last decade, they have been almost entirely wiped out from the West Coast, only surviving in small pockets between Santa Barbara and Alaska. In Marin and Sonoma, their numbers have been wiped out by nearly 90%, replaced by vast areas of urchins, called urchin barrens. One such barren reaches hundreds of miles from Marin County, all the way to the Oregon border, according to work conducted by UC Davis researchers.

Habitats, Sonoma Coast, Wildlifehabitat restoration, kelp forest, sea urchins

Press Release: Governor Newsom launches California’s ‘Salmon Strategy for a Hotter, Drier Future’

January 30, 2024

Office of Governor Gavin Newsom

WHAT YOU NEED TO KNOW: To restore populations of salmon amidst hotter and drier weather exacerbated by climate change, Governor Newsom announced California’s first strategy to protect the iconic fish species for generations to come.

Governor Gavin Newsom today announced new actions and efforts already underway that California is taking to help restore California’s salmon populations.

Salmon Strategy for a Hotter, Drier Future

After 10 years of rapidly intensifying drought and more extreme weather, salmon are not doing well. Last year, with projections showing Chinook salmon population at historic lows, the salmon season was closed and the Newsom Administration requested a Federal Fishery Disaster to support impacted communities. Additionally, due to crashing salmon populations in 2023, some tribes canceled their religious and cultural harvests for the first time ever.

The strategy’s six priorities call for:

1. Removing barriers and modernizing infrastructure for salmon migration
2. Restoring habitat
3. Protecting water flows in key rivers at the right times
4. Modernizing hatcheries
5. Transforming technology and management systems
6. Strengthening partnerships

Habitats, Water, Wildlifedams, endangered species, fish hatchery, fisheries, habitat restoration, salmon

Hwy. 37 could be under water by 2050. Here’s how Caltrans plans to keep traffic flowing

September 18, 2022

Colin Atagi, NORTH BAY BUSINESS JOURNAL

The favored plan also proposes the route have a 60 mph speed limit, as well as two lanes in each direction with bicycle and pedestrian paths. The plan is in its early stages and officials haven’t identified a cost or funding source.

Caltrans, in order to keep traffic flowing decades from now, intends to build an elevated road along Highway 37 to combat rising water levels, which are expected to eventually inundate the North Bay arterial.

The proposed project essentially stretches across the existing route along San Pablo Bay and through Marin, Sonoma, Napa and Solano counties.

It preserves travel patterns, allows landward marsh migration and is resilient to sea level rises, officials said in explaining its benefits.

Climate Change & Energy, Habitats, Transportation, Wildlifebike lanes, bike/pedestrian bridge, flooding, habitat restoration, Highway 37, marsh migration, San Pablo Bay, sea level rise, wetlands

Wetlands advocates work to raise Highway 37

August 11, 2022

Dan Ashley & Tom Didion, ABC7 NEWS

There’s a vocal debate over building a better Bay Area, by building a better highway. At stake is not just traffic, but potentially vast stretches of restored wetlands.

When Kendall Webster gazes across the levees and farmland in southern Sonoma County, she can envision the tidal marshes that once flushed water back and forth from meandering waterways to San Pablo Bay.

“And so this whole flatland here was a mosaic of tidal wetlands,” she explains.

It’s a vast expanse of wetlands that the Sonoma Land Trust and their partners are working to restore.

“And you know, California is investing in climate, the way no other state in the country is right now. So we think that this is the natural infrastructure project that the state should be highlighting,” Webster maintains.

To make that vision a reality, the Trust has joined with Save the Bay and more than a dozen environmental and land management groups, urging Cal/Trans and the state to remove the one barrier that could open up natural marshland across the entire North Bay.

Land Use, Transportationflooding, habitat restoration, Highway 37, levees, sea level rise, tidal ecosystem, tidal flow, wetlands migration, wetlands restoration