Lagunitas Creek
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Lagunitas Creek is a stream in Marin County, California and is a major supply of drinking water to the area. The 25-mile long creek's headwaters are in the Coast Range and it flows into the Pacific Ocean, draining 103 square miles.
The creek's source is the northern slope of Mount Tamalpais, a few miles east of Bolinas Lagoon. The creek begins as three forks, the East Fork, Middle Fork and West Fork. After about a mile, they all flow into Lake Lagunitas, which drains into Bon Tempe Lake, which drains into Alpine Lake. Downstream of Alpine Lake, the creek flows roughly northwest until it reaches Kent Lake. Just downstream of Kent Lake, San Geronimo Creek joins the creek. Lagunitas continues northwest and is joined by its largest tributary, Nicasio Creek, which flows from Nicasio Reservoir, another water storage reservoir. Shortly after its confluence with Nicasio Creek, Lagunitas turns east briefly before heading northwest again. After this, the creek quickly flows into Tomales Bay.
Each of the reservoirs in the watershed has a dam and the biggest problem in the watershed is their blocking of the streams, which prevents fish migration and dewaters the streambed. Roy's Dam on San Geronimo Creek was built in the 1920s to supply water to a ranch. It was an obstacle for coho salmon and steelhead trying access to the habitat upstream of the dam for spawning. It was decided to lower the dam instead of completely removing it because of the large amount of sediment that had accumulated behind the dam. Erosion is also a significant problem in the watershed.
[edit] References
- Trout Unlimited California
- Oakland Museum of California
- Klamath Resource Information System
- Connections Run Deep in Lagunitas Creek: article on native flora and spawning salmon in the San Francisco Chronicle by Locals Only columnist Geoffrey Coffey
