126 Steelhead Made it up to Los Padres Dam

 

"The Carmel River is small and picturesque, nestled in the hills of the Carmel Valley. The river itself is fairly small, only flowing about 30 miles from the peaks of the Santa Lucia and Sierra de Salinas to the lagoon at Carmel Bay. It is also a naturally intermittent system, with historic estimates suggesting the lower portions of the river may only have had year-round flow in about six of every ten years. Although these characteristics represent challenges for anadromous fish, it is believed that an average of 8,000 adult steelhead would historically spawn in the Carmel watershed every year.

As of 2015, for the first time in nearly a century, steelhead were able to move upstream unimpeded past the former site of the San Clemente Dam, which was removed due to both public safety and ecological concerns. Fish still face a barrier to movement at Los Padres Dam, but between January and May of this year, a total of 126 adults made their way to the dam."

From: FishBio

Carmel Fire 2020

 

From Carmel River Watershed Conservancy

Carmel Fire 2020

 

From: Carmel Valley Locals

The area in which the River Fire first gained traction hadn't had a fire in recorded history. This helped feed the flames that destroyed 43 structures and put about 20,000 people under evacuation warning.

Cal Fire previously attempted to carry out controlled burns but was stopped several times between 2013 and 2017 by members of the public who were leery of the controlled burn coming too close to their homes. 

From: The Californian

River Fire August 2020

 

Picture from San Clemente Rancho 

Air quality at ‘hazardous’ level, River Fire grows to nearly 34,000 acres

August 20, 2020: EVACUATION ORDERS

 

From: https://www.facebook.com/groups/CarmelValleyLocals/

Fire Above the old San Clemente Dam August 2020

 

From: https://www.facebook.com/groups/CarmelValleyLocals/

Archbishop says Satan is Behind Defaced Statues of Saint Serra

The archbishop of San Francisco claimed Father Junipero Serra, the man famed for bringing Catholicism to California in the 1700s, is a "great hero" and "great defender" of Indigenous peoples and partly blamed the removal of Serra's monument in Golden Gate Park on the Devil.

Serra is considered by some to be a de facto slave owner who used the labor of Native individuals against their will to build the missions.

From SFGate

Punta de los Lobos Marinos

After the establishment of San Carlos Borromeo de Carmelo the mission's cowboys, or vaqueros, tended herds of cattle on the nearby grasslands and became the first non-native people to use what is now Point Lobos State Reserve property. It was also during the era of Spanish occupation that Point Lobos was first named, when the barking of sea lions inspired the name Punta de los Lobos Marinos, Point of the Sea Wolves.

From: Point Lobos

Case Studies in Demographic Collapse

"The Franciscan missionaries stationed at San Carlos Mission (established in 1770) recruited converts from the Carmel River basin and nearby areas from the 1770's through the first decade of the nineteenth century. 

The Indian  population increased in size until the last phase of active recruitment occurred in the 1803-7 quinquennium, during which period the missionaries baptized 108 converts, 71 in the year 1806 alone. After 1807 only 24 more converts came to the mission, and the population of the mission began a steady decline. 

The numbers reached a recorded maximum of 876 in 1795, to a mere 165 in 1834, on the eve of the secularization of the mission.

The mission population experienced a net decline of 62 percent per generation and mean life expectancy was low, averaging 7.6 years at birth.  "

From: Indians, Franciscans, and Spanish Colonization by Jackson and Castillo, 1995

Scott Barn 1863

Monterey County Register of Historic Resources: Scott Barn 1863

From Hastings Natural History Reserve

Finch Creek spawning habitat

Hastings Natural History Reservation secured a $100,000 grant from MPWMD to do the design/engineering/permitting work to replace this stream crossing! 

MPWMD found that the concrete ford at Hastings on Finch Creek was the 6th worst barrier on Carmel River tributaries. 

Finch Creek is high in the watershed and contains critical spawning habitat for Steelhead. 

From: Carmel River Watershed Conservancy

it has everything a river should have

From: Carmel River Watershed Conservancy

Big Sur Land Trust Acquires Patriarch Ridge

The Big Sur Land Trust has acquired 83.5 acres of property atop Patriarch Ridge in Carmel Valley.

The land is a mix of old growth mixed evergreen woodland, chaparral and grassland habitat. A dense canopy of stately trees creates an open, park-like understory with adjacent woodlands, grassy slopes and chaparral-covered hillslopes that drop steeply into shaded redwood canyons.

Patriarch Ridge is a very important part of the Esselen Tribe’s sacred lands and includes the upper watershed divide between Williams Canyon and the Garzas Creek drainage. The Esselen name for Patriarch Ridge is “Tebitylat” — meaning “resting spot.”

It has been used for countless generations of Esselen and Rumsen people for ceremonies and as a travel route and corridor for bringing in important food sources from the coast on the northern end of Big Sur at the villages of Sarhentaruc and Ixchenta.

From Monterey Herald

California Indian Pre-Contact Tribal Territories

From: CIMCC