Fire at Putah Creek..

Mike42 · Veteran Member

RE: Fire at Putah Creek..

Xnjb707X · Senior Member

kbarn wrote:
I think everyone should just let the creek sleep for the year, with guides as the exception.

Yes the creek should be closed at least for the rest of the season until next general season open, or everyone could just give it a break. Except for guides tho!? I hope that was a joke, cuz that statement is ridiculous. Too many hack guides show up in the winter just for when the spawn is on as it is. Limiting the creek to those flunkies would be a debacle.

- Nic

kbarn · Veteran Member

I wan't referring to hack guides, rather ones with integrity like Bono.

bono · Master Fly Fishing Guide

Our ranch which is 300 yards from access #5 got completely torched. My son / ranch hand and myself saved 2 houses and 3 barns, no thanks to cal fire.... Completely worthless!!! I could rant about that issue forever but I won't . Anyhow areas of the island at access 5 are desert like, in my 30 years of having property there I have never seen access like this before! I surveyed the entire water shed from wild horse canyon down to lake solano via motorcycle and I am really worried. My concern is how hot the fire burned and as a result how loose and powder like the soil is. Those little feeder streams are really steep and if we have just a normal winter putah will have an enormous amount of silt washed in. If we have an El Niño winter like what is forecast, putah will be completely choked. Not to mention the cold canyon watershed is huge and the entire watershed is torched, that alone will wash in tons of silt , wiping out the upper area spawning beds. Only time will tell....

SK60 · Senior Member

Solano County Water Agency (aka here as SCWA) is also very concerned. You might recall that during the 1996-97 el nino (EN) Cold Creek (CC) flows pushed large boulders across the entire creek, damming it and putting the Dam base structures at risk of flooding. SCWA had to quickly get heavy equipment in to remove the new dam.

SCWA is already evaluating short and long term effects of erosion in the CC watershed. PGE is providing LIDAR 3D images and a complete aerial survey of the entire burn area to help ID and grade erosion risk.

The coming winter is going to be scary regardless of the amount of rain. Water quality is going to be an issue, not just for the fish, but also all the I-80 corridor customers.

This is an opportunity for this forum's members to be a big help by noting and reporting anything they see that may be impacting the creek environment-fallen trees, flow blockages by debris, etc.