Wednesday March 29, 2023
San Francisco Estuary Magazine —
When the restoration of Lookout Slough is complete, Lookout Slough will be no more. Created to provide water for a century-old duck-hunting club, the human-made canal will be filled in as part of a $119 million, 3,400-acre tidal wetlands restoration, the largest ever in the Sacramento-San Joaquin Delta.
“Drought and climate change have elevated the importance of these types of multi-benefit projects,” said Karla Nemeth, director of the California Department of Water Resources, when the project broke ground last June. “This project will reduce flood risk for communities in the Central Valley and create much-needed habitat for Delta smelt and other endangered and threatened fish species.”
By their expected completion in late 2024, the new tidal wetlands will replace former irrigated pasture and duck-hunting clubs in eastern Solano County at the lower end of the Yolo Bypass. In addition to creating shallow-water aquatic habitat, the transformed area will provide 40,000 acre-feet of water storage to help prevent flooding and protect surrounding communities.
“The current science is that between 60,000 and 80,000 acres of habitat need to be restored in the Delta,” says Charlotte Biggs, project manager for the Department of Water Resources.