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North Coast Groups Are Suing Over a Rule Change That Could Undo the Klamath River’s Comeback
The wild salmon swimming freely up the undammed Klamath River have become Exhibit A in a looming federal lawsuit. A coalition of North Coast conservation groups intends to sue the Trump administration over its new reading of the Endangered Species Act, which holds that destroying a species’ habitat no longer counts as harm. The Western … The post North Coast
Viral Footage Captures Dangerously Overcrowded Conditions on Yosemite’s Mist Trail
The Mist Trail has always been a workout. Now it’s a traffic jam on wet granite. A viral video captured in late June shows a wall of hikers inching shoulder to shoulder up the steep stone staircase toward Vernal Fall, forcing people to squeeze past each other on narrow, spray-slicked steps hundreds of feet above … The post Viral Footage Captures Dangerously
A Campaign Is Underway to Bring Back One of Big Basin Redwood’s Most Beloved Trails
California’s oldest state park has a birthday coming up, and one nonprofit wants to hand it the perfect gift: a beloved trail back from the ashes. Sempervirens Fund, the conservation group whose founders helped establish Big Basin Redwoods State Park in 1902, has launched a fundraising campaign to rebuild the Timms Creek Loop Trail. The … The post A Campaign
DNA Confirms Bone Found in Eel River Belonged to Hunter Missing Since 2021
A single bone pulled from the banks of the Eel River has finally given a McKinleyville family the answer they waited nearly five years to hear. The Mendocino County Sheriff’s Office confirmed through DNA testing that a bone found by a fisher in February belonged to John Thomas Davis III, a 48-year-old hunter who vanished … The post DNA Confirms Bone Found in
Dry Lightning Is Coming to Northern California This Week and Fire Crews Are Bracing
The worst thing that can happen to a landscape this dry is a thunderstorm that brings lightning and no rain. That is roughly what Northern California is looking at this week. The National Weather Service office in Sacramento is forecasting scattered morning showers across the valley, foothills and mountains, with another round of storms expected … The post D
New Research Details How Mountain Lions Navigate Around Hikers in the Santa Cruz Mountains
Every hiker who has ever felt watched on a quiet stretch of singletrack can relax a little. The mountain lions know exactly where you are, and they are working hard to be somewhere else. Researchers at UC Santa Cruz spent years fitting pumas in the Santa Cruz Mountains with GPS collars, then compared the animals’ … The post New Research Details How Mountain
The NorCal Coast Is Under Another Flood Advisory, and Tides Are Running Nearly Two Feet High
The Pacific is running high again, and coastal parking lots are paying for it. The National Weather Service has a coastal flood advisory in effect for the Pacific Coast through early Wednesday morning, with a separate advisory covering the North Bay interior valleys and San Francisco Bay shoreline running through Thursday. Astronomical tides are pushing … Th
One of California’s Oldest Nude Beaches Is About to Become a State Park
For roughly sixty years, getting to San Gregorio’s clothing-optional beach meant pulling off Highway 1, paying a few bucks to whoever was working the gate, and parking on a bluff owned by a private family. That era ends this month. Peninsula Open Space Trust has purchased the 238-acre San Gregorio Ranch for $10 million and … The post One of California’s Olde
The Elephant Fire Doubled Overnight to 12,303 Acres and It’s Burning Through an Old Fire Scar Again
Six years ago the Loyalton Fire tore through the grass and timber northeast of town. The Elephant Fire is now retracing that exact path, and it is moving fast. The blaze has burned 12,303 acres since igniting near Highway 49 on Saturday afternoon, and containment remains stuck at 5%. Evacuation orders in Lassen County have … The post The Elephant Fire Double
A National Travel Magazine Just Discovered NorCal’s Most Underrated Redwood Grove
Muir Woods gets the tour buses. Armstrong Redwoods gets the silence. Travel + Leisure just published a full visitor guide to Armstrong Redwoods State Natural Reserve, giving national attention to one of Northern California’s most underrated old-growth groves. Tucked just north of Guerneville in Sonoma County, the 805-acre reserve protects some of the last pr
The Twain Fire Is Holding at 276 Acres, and the Dixie Fire Is Why It’s Dangerous
The Feather River Canyon is still recovering from the Dixie Fire, and now firefighters are working inside its bones. The Twain Fire, burning just east of the town of Twain on the north side of Highway 70, has held at 276 acres and climbed to 35% containment. It broke out Saturday afternoon and grew quickly … The post The Twain Fire Is Holding at 276 Acres, a
This Popular California Destination Just Got Named the Most Polluted National Park in America
Stand at Beetle Rock in Sequoia National Park on a truly clear day and you should be able to see 105 miles into the distance. Most summer days, you can’t come close. A gray film of valley smog hangs over one of California’s most treasured landscapes, and a new report confirms what park regulars have … The post This Popular California Destination Just Got Nam
The Award-Winning Film About Kayaking the Undammed Klamath Is Free to Watch Right Now
A film about the rebirth of the Klamath River just made its way to the communities that know the river best. Oregon Public Broadcasting brought its acclaimed documentary First Descent: Kayaking the Klamath to the Rogue Valley, screening it at Ashland’s Varsity Theatre with producer Jessie Sears and the paddlers’ story taking center stage. Now, … The post The
The Battle Over Shasta Dam Water Releases Hits a Major Turning Point in Federal Court
The legal battle over how much water flows out of Shasta Lake this summer just tipped in favor of the federal government, and salmon advocates are not happy about it. Maven’s Notebook reported that a U.S. District Court on July 9 denied a temporary restraining order that would have forced the Bureau of Reclamation to … The post The Battle Over Shasta Dam Wat
Scientists Just Explained How a Wildfire Killed Thousands of Fish on the Klamath River
For five hours in 2022, a stretch of the Klamath River held no oxygen at all. Zero. Now scientists know exactly why. The USGS released a new study documenting how a monsoon storm during the McKinney Fire flushed ash, charcoal, and sediment off scorched hillsides in Siskiyou County and straight into the river. Dissolved oxygen … The post Scientists Just Expla
Video Shows a Bear Charging a Dad Outside His Lake Tahoe Home
A Fourth of July boating trip at Lake Tahoe nearly turned into something much worse when a black bear charged a Sacramento father in his own driveway, and the entire encounter was caught on video. Cortlandt Koerwitz’s daughters were packing coolers in the garage of the family’s Tahoe vacation home when they spotted a bear … The post Video Shows a Bear Chargi
The Search For a Hunter Who Vanished Into the Eel River in 2021 Just Took a Dramatic Turn
Nearly five years after a Humboldt County hunter vanished into a storm-swollen Eel River, searchers are back in the canyon east of Covelo, and this time they may have found something. SFGATE reported that Mendocino County search teams spent Saturday combing the Eel River canyon along Highway 162 for signs of John Davis, who disappeared … The post The Search
Wildlife Officers Seize Illegal Gold Suction Dredge Out of the Klamath River
It took a helicopter and a ground crew to haul one illegal gold dredge out of the Klamath River, a sign of how seriously California is treating a practice it says wrecks fish habitat. On June 24, wildlife officers patrolling near Happy Camp cited a miner for possessing a suction dredge in closed state waters. … The post Wildlife Officers Seize Illegal Gold S
Yosemite Just Had One of the Busiest Junes in Its History
Anyone who circled a full parking lot in Yosemite Valley last month can now put a number on the frustration. June visitation climbed to a near-record high 634,508 total visits, the strongest sign yet that the park’s first unrestricted summer in years is shaping up to be one of its busiest ever. The only June … The post Yosemite Just Had One of the Busiest Ju
California Sheriffs Can Now Use Rubber Bullets and Pepper Balls on Wolves
The gray wolf’s improbable return to California is running headfirst into the state’s cattle country, and ranchers are getting new tools to push back. Sheriffs across Northern California can now use rubber bullets and pepper balls to haze wolves away from livestock, a nonlethal shift aimed at easing one of the state’s thorniest wildlife conflicts. … The post