Tuesday August 11, 2026
CCST —
California’s Central Valley was once a shifting mosaic of wetlands and floodplains, where rivers spread across the land each winter and drew back each summer. That rhythm fed young salmon and sustained a way of life for the Native American Tribes who have fished here since long before there was a California. Most of those floodplains are gone now, drained and cut off from the rivers that made them. Salmon have held on, and they remain a food source for Tribes and a livelihood for fishing families up and down the coast. Those families just went three straight years without a season due to low numbers.
The same rivers now run through the hub of California’s water system: the Sacramento–San Joaquin Delta, which, through its connection to major State and federal water projects, supplies drinking water to over 27 million people and irrigates about 3 million acres of farmland. Now, California is investing in rebuilding wetlands and floodplains, because they are needed for salmon, a fish that is culturally and ecologically irreplaceable, and because they are essential for a healthy water supply for humans, not to mention their function in reducing flood risk for Central Valley communities.