Planning Tomorrow's California

Dinkey Creek flows for more than 27 miles from the high country of the Dinkey Lakes Wilderness, pass spectacular Dinkey Dome, and into a rugged canyon that ultimately leads all the way to the Kings River. Long threatened by a dam project, the middle segment of Dinkey Creek is a popular recreation destination for families from the Fresno/Clovis area, offering outstanding scenery appreciated by campers, anglers, hikers, and families simply escaping the summer heat. Expert whitewater kayakers consider lower Dinkey Creek to be world destination for class V (class VI is unrunnable) kayaking. Enter “Dinkey Creek kayaking” in your computer browser to view truly astounding examples of whitewater kayaking over the waterfalls of lower Dinkey Creek. The upper portion of the creek flows through the potential Dinkey Dome Addition, part of a more than 43,000-acre complex of potential additions to the Dinkey Lakes Wilderness. Lower Dinkey Creek flows through the 10,000-acre Sycamore Springs Potential Wilderness just upstream of the creek’s confluence with the North Fork Kings River.

Flowing through the deepest canyon in North America, the mighty Kings River forms the boundary between the Sierra and Sequoia National Forests. Much of the upper Kings is already protected in the Kings Canyon-Sequoia National Park, Monarch Wilderness, and as a Wild & Scenic River. But a 12-mile segment of the river downstream from these protected areas flows through the 28,000-acre unprotected Kings River roadless area. This segment of the Kings River is a state designated Wild Trout Stream and is a popular destination for whitewater boating. Establishment of the Kings River Special Management Area by Congress in 1987 shelved a dam project that threatened the river but it did not provide the area with the same level of protection as Wilderness. Protecting the river as Wild & Scenic and the roadless area as Wilderness would permanently protect an area that ranges from 1,000 feet elevation in the Sierra foothills to 12,000 feet elevation in the High Sierra. This not only protects a diverse area for a wide range of wildlife and plant species, it also provides protected habitat for climate change-induced migration of wildlife and plant species to higher elevation areas as our climate warms.

Adjacent to the existing Golden Trout Wilderness, these potential additions represent the largest complex of unroaded lands in the Sierra Nevada. They feature great ecological diversity due to their wildness, size, and elevations ranging from 3,000 feet along the North Fork Kern Wild & Scenic River to almost 10,000 feet atop Lookout Mountain. Protecting this area would preserve a continuous uninterrupted transition of ecosystems from the sagebrush and gray pine dominated landscape along the North Fork Kern to the conifer forests of the Kern Plateau. Durrwood Creek is an untouched tributary watershed that supports endangered golden trout and the upper North Fork Kern is home to the rare Kern River rainbow trout. The proposed Wilderness additions are also important summer range for deer migrating from Sequoia-Kings Canyon National Park. According to scientific reports, the protected and unprotected roadless lands in the North Fork Kern watershed (including the Golden Trout Wilderness and its potential additions) provide the river with a high level of biological integrity.

A state-designated Wild Trout Stream, Hot Creek is a popular destination for eastern Sierra visitors to view boiling hot springs and fish for wild trout, all framed by the magnificent backdrop of the eastern Sierra escarpment. Hot Creek is but one manifestation of the Long Valley Caldera, which erupted catastrophically 760,000 years ago. Pyroclastic ash from the eruption was carried by the wind eastward to what is now Kansas. A series of earthquakes and uplifting of the caldera floor by magma gathering deep underground in 1980 prompted government geologists to monitor the caldera. Meanwhile, bathing in Hot Creek was prohibited for safety reasons but visitors can still visit the thermal area along the creek and fish for wild trout downstream. Wild & Scenic protection of 3.5 miles of Hot Creek would preserve its outstanding scenic, recreational, wild trout fishery, geological, and ecological values. The proposed designation encompasses public lands managed by the Forest Service and Bureau of Land Management (BLM).

This 70,000 acre potential Wilderness is the only east-west mountain range in the eastern Sierra region. The spring-fed creeks, abundant meadows, and aspen groves in this relatively dry and desolate area is sustained by a stream of Pacific moisture that makes its way through Deadman Pass – a low point in the high Sierra crest directly west of Glass Mountain. Steep-walled canyons and high volcanic ridges add to the diversity of this truly unique ecological, recreational, and cultural resource, which is also an important migratory corridor and refuge for wildlife and plant species responding to climate change. Dexter Canyon and its tributaries have carved more than 25 miles of deeply incised rim-rock canyons reminiscent of the desert southwest. Dexter Canyon flows from a large meadow that supports aspen groves, willow thickets, bunch grasses, and sedges. A unique mix of Jeffrey, pinyon, and limber pine grow on the canyon slopes and rims, with occasional groves of snowbank aspen. Sagebrush tends to dominate the drier flats and slopes of the area. The entire area provides incredibly diverse habitat and is home to a wide variety of wildlife, including goshawk, greater sage grouse, black-backed woodpeckers, willow flycatchers, nesting golden eagles, badgers, abundant mule deer, and brook trout. A scientific assessment found that Dexter Canyon and its tributaries possess a high level of aquatic integrity.