Monumental Questions - Tell me More About Cache Creek

Kristie Ehrhardt • May 11, 2022

Cache Creek flows past Valley Vista Regional Park as it enters Capay Valley

Cache Creek begins at Clear Lake and is the only outlet for the Lake. The Cache Creek watershed flows east through Lake, Colusa and Yolo Counties and eventually into a settling basin near Woodland where the sediments are allowed to settle out and the water is then released into the Yolo Bypass and eventually into the Sacramento River through a series of flood control channels.


Upper Cache Creek courses through a canyon vegetated mainly with chaparral and is generally inaccessible. There are a few tributaries that flow into Cache Creek but the two major tributaries are the North Fork and Bear Creek. The North Fork begins north of Clear Lake on the slopes of Goat Mountain in the Mendocino National Forest, through the Indian Valley Reservoir and into Cache Creek below Highway 20. Bear Creek flows through the wildflower hotspot of Bear Valley and joins Cache Creek in Colusa County, then progresses through Yolo County’s splendid Capay Valley.


The name “Cache Creek” comes from the then Canadian-owned Hudson Bay Company, which began exploring Northern California via the Siskiyou Trail between 1820 and 1830. In 1828 they began trapping along the Sacramento River and caching their furs and pelts along the river’s tributaries, including Cache Creek – and the name stuck.


A landslide that resulted from the 1906 San Francisco earthquake temporarily blocked Cache Creek north of the town of Rumsey. The blockage caused the creek level to drop drastically and, in some places, it went completely dry. Eventually the creek broke through the mud and caused severe flooding in Rumsey. A rock ledge, called the Grigsby Riffle, approximately a mile and a half downstream from Clear Lake restricts water flow and increases the chances of flooding for communities around the lake. In 1914, a dam was constructed on the main fork of Cache Creek a few miles downstream of Clear Lake. The dam, cleverly named Cache Creek Dam, was built to increase the lake’s capacity and to regulate the outflow but the narrow, shallow creek channel does not allow the water to flow as fast as the dam can release it. This causes the water in Clear Lake to rise rapidly after prolonged rain events and to decrease very slowly. If flows were increased by altering the creek channel, communities downstream in Yolo County would be subject to flooding. This has been a long-standing squabble between counties resulting in court decisions and ongoing negotiations. The Capay Diversion Dam was constructed approximately 50 miles downstream from the Cache Creek Dam to distribute water throughout Yolo County using a network of canals and water control structures. 


Beginning in the early 1800’s and for about the next 150 years, mercury (also called quicksilver) mining took place along Cache Creek and other waterways in California. Because there were no environmental regulations then, waste from mining activities made its way uncontrolled into Cache causing an increase in mercury in both the creek and eventually the Sacramento River. In 2004 the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) stated that the mercury level was continuing to rise in Cache Creek and that the source was nearly forty old mines along the drainage. Several partners including the Bureau of Land Management (BLM), the Cache Creek Technical Advisory Committee, UC Davis, Tuleyome and others are working to monitor mercury levels and to organize and guide mine-remediation.


Although barriers exclude fall run chinook salmon and steelhead from migrating up Cache Creek, in years with very high flow conditions, some salmon may spawn in the lower regions of the creek. The portion of the creek above the Capay Dam provides one of the best native fisheries for pikeminnow, hitch California roach and Sacramento suckers on the west side of the Valley. Other species include large and smallmouth bass and catfish.


Tuleyome led the effort to have thirty-one miles of Cache Creek designated as a California Wild and Scenic River and the watershed includes the 27,245-acre Cache Creek Wilderness Area which is managed by the BLM. It is home to two herds of Tule Elk, Bald Eagles and many other species of plants and wildlife. Further downstream, the Cache Creek Conservancy has restored a 130-acre site known as the Cache Creek Nature Preserve. Cache Creek offers many recreational opportunities including whitewater rafting (spring and summer when water is released), kayaking, canoeing, tubing, hiking and camping and more.


-Kristie Ehrhardt; kehrhardt@tuleyome.org


Tuleyome Land Conservation Program Manager

RECENT ARTICLES

Beavers, otters, and more – new Conaway Ranch game camera footage!

By Geoff Benn • June 4, 2026
A beaver at Conaway Ranch We’ve got new footage from our game cameras at Conaway Ranch! This camera site was chosen by 4 th graders from Dingle Elementary during a recent field trip to Conaway. The camera is near the otter slide we’ve previously filmed, but is a few feet away from the entrance to the slide, allowing us to film the animals as they approach. We saw beaver, otter, a fox, a raccoon, and more! Click here to watch the video . Tuleyome works with Conaway Preservation Group to offer educational programs at Conaway Ranch, including programs for K-12 groups and the general public. If you have any questions about the game camera footage or our programs at Conaway, please reach out to Education Associate Geoff Benn at gbenn@tuleyome.org.

Policy Corner: It’s Time to Fight for Our Public Lands

June 4, 2026
The current administration has released its proposed budget for the 2027 fiscal year. It proposes drastic cuts to our public land management agencies. The proposed budget would significantly reduce funding for the Bureau of Land Management (BLM), including a 34% cut to its total budget, a 27% staff cut, a 76% cut to the National Conservation Lands, which encompass 38 million acres of protected public lands, a 61% cut to recreation management (including campsites and trails), and total elimination of funding for cultural resources and wilderness management. It also would shift priorities towards extractive uses of public lands instead of conservation and clean energy. The administration’s budget would also drastically cut funding to the U.S. Forest Service (USFS), eliminate several offices, state and federal research stations (six in California) and transfer all fire fighting to BLM. Notably, in the face of all these cuts, the budget would increase funding for extractive industries; funding for timber sales would increase 450%. The reductions and policy changes would impair these agencies’ abilities to protect public lands, cultural resources, fresh water sources, and wildlife, while also impairing access to them and recreation on them. The President’s budget is now in Congress, where committees in both the Senate and the House of Representatives are amending and voting on the bills in preparation for full House and Senate votes. Now is the time to take action for our public lands and the environment by urging Congress to reject the proposed budget and maintain funding for BLM, USFS, and programs that protect and steward our public lands. Let your representatives know that you oppose the cuts to BLM and USFS and the rollbacks to our public land protections. And let them know why these special places are important to them. You can voice your opinions to Congress in multiple ways. You can: Call their offices Send a letter to Congress - we’ve pulled together a template for you to use, but don’t forget to let them know why public lands are important to you – download sample letter here Contact them on social media Meet with a representative in their District offices. Don’t know how to reach them, go to Congress.gov and find their phone numbers, addresses, district offices, websites and so much more if you’re interested. Now is the time to speak up for our public lands! Mary Lamborn (Communications Intern) and Sandra Schubert (Executive Director)

Monumental Questions - Another Monumental Vegetable?

By Kristie Ehrhardt • June 4, 2026
You betcha! Wild carrot, also known as Queen Anne’s Lace, is a common sight within the Berryessa Snow Mountain National Monument region. With its straight and sturdy stalk, bright green, frilly leaves and white, flat-topped flower clusters, it is identifiable even from the limited viewing scope of a traveling car. Queen Anne’s Lace ( Daucus carota ) belongs to the Apiaceae (carrot) family. All members of this family display flower clusters arranged in an upside-down umbrella shape called an umbel. It is native to Europe and is the plant that tasty cultivated carrots originated from. It was brought to North America for its medicinal purposes and has since naturalized across the continent in disturbed and natural areas in mountains, valleys and coastal areas. It can be so prolific that it outcompetes native plants and can also be mildly toxic to livestock. Queen Anne’s Lace is an herbaceous biennial (it doesn’t flower until its second year and then dies) that can reach up to four feet tall in optimum conditions. The stem of the plant is bright green, straight and sturdy and is covered in short, coarse hairs which is a very helpful identifier. I recently learned a clever and helpful quip that I will never forget: Queen Anne has hairy legs (referring to the hair along the stems of the plant)! The tiny, white flowers all originate from the same point and splay out in an airy, flat topped cluster (umbel). Another identifying feature is that oftentimes (but not always) the flower umbels often have a single dark purple flower in the center of the cluster. This purple flower is not always present but when it is it can be used to positively identify the plant as Queen Anne’s lace. The leaves are finely divided which gives them a lacy appearance and look almost identical to our cultivated carrot plants. Although wild carrots are edible, the whitish tap root isn’t as robust or flavorful as the cultivated carrots we are used to. Warning! There are plants such as poison hemlock that are incredibly similar looking so eating things in nature is never advised unless you can absolutely identify them! Poison hemlock has basically the same growth pattern as wild carrot however the stem of poison hemlock lacks the tiny hairs and mature plants have very definite purple splotches up and down the stems. All parts of poison hemlock are toxic but it is particularly potent in the seeds and roots. Poison hemlock is notoriously known as the poison that killed the Greek philosopher Socrates. Edible cousins of wild carrot include plants such as caraway, celery, parsley and parsnips. Although the root of the wild carrot plant is edible, contact with the sap may produce an allergic reaction in some individuals that are sensitive to it. Native pollinators such as butterflies and bees appreciate the abundance of flowers for their nectar. Wild carrot is currently blooming in all its glory so keep an eye out for it on your next trip to our favorite monument!