Los Gatos Creek (Santa Clara County)

Coordinates: 37°00′02″N 121°53′57″W / 37.00056°N 121.89917°W / 37.00056; -121.89917
Source: Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia.
Los Gatos Creek
Arroyo de Los Gatos, Jones Creek
Chemeketa Park
Physical characteristics
SourceLoma Prieta Mountain in the Santa Cruz Mountains
 • coordinates37°06′36″N 121°50′48″W / 37.11000°N 121.84667°W / 37.11000; -121.84667[2]
 • elevation3,250 ft (990 m)
MouthGuadalupe River
 • location
San Jose, California
 • coordinates
37°00′02″N 121°53′57″W / 37.00056°N 121.89917°W / 37.00056; -121.89917[2]
 • elevation
69 ft (21 m)[2]
Basin features
Tributaries 
 • leftMoody Gulch,[3] Aldercroft Creek, Briggs Creek, Black Creek, Lyndon Canyon Creek, Trout Creek
 • rightAustrian Gulch, Hooker Gulch Creek, Hendrys Creek, Soda Springs Creek, Limekiln Canyon Creek, Dry Creek

The Los Gatos Creek runs 24 miles (39 km) in

Guadalupe Watershed from the Santa Cruz Mountains northward through the Santa Clara Valley until its confluence with the Guadalupe River in downtown San Jose. The Guadalupe River then continues onward into San Francisco Bay
.

The creek begins in the Santa Cruz mountains near the

Vasona Reservoir, then northeasterly through Campbell and San Jose where it meets the Guadalupe River.[5]

History

Upper Los Gatos Creek confluence with Lexington Reservoir
Between Lexington Reservoir and downtown Los Gatos, the creek runs in a deep concrete culvert alongside the Los Gatos Creek Trail
Great blue heron reflected in Los Gatos Creek

The creek was named after the

Vasona Lake County Park. On Hare's 1872 map the creek was called Arroyo de Los Gatos and Zachariah Jones called it Jones Creek at the time he laid out the town he called Jones Mill (which later became the now submerged Lexington, California).[1] Forbes Mill
was established by James Forbes along the creek in the 1850s; the town of Los Gatos was subsequently built around the mill.

In 1866, extreme flooding of the Los Gatos Creek caused it to naturally cut a new channel in what is now the Willow Glen neighborhood of San Jose, running west and north of its original channel. The reshaped creek left behind a dry creek bed, known as Dry Creek. Today's Dry Creek Road runs parallel to the creek bed.[6]

The construction of State Route 17 in the 1950s forced much of the creek through Los Gatos to be diverted into a concrete gulch. As a Caltrans magazine from the era describes it: "Included in this project is a relocation of Los Gatos Creek for a distance of 6,000 feet, requiring a concrete line channel." The Los Gatos Daily Times on Aug. 31, 1954, reported that "bulldozers have virtually completed clearing and leveling the bed of Los Gatos Creek, and preparations are readied for laying the concrete culvert."

Also in the 1950s, the construction of the James J. Lenihan Dam formed Lexington Reservoir, which flooded much of a small valley above Los Gatos, including the former townsites of Lexington and Alma. The dam and reservoir were completed in 1952, forcing the rerouting of Highway 17. When the reservoir's water level is low, the concrete bed of the old highway through those towns can be seen, along with foundations from some buildings. In spite of these events, much of the creek maintains its natural course and beauty.

Below

Vasona Park, Los Gatos Creek feeds percolation ponds that are part of the groundwater recharge system built by the Santa Clara Valley Water District. North of Lark Avenue, one can also see a structure resembling a fountain, where imported water from other reservoirs is also added to Los Gatos Creek for recharge. In the 1920s, people discovered that Santa Clara Valley was sinking because of groundwater pumping. San Jose's elevation subsided 13 feet from 1910 to 1970s, correlated with a 250 feet decline in the underground water table.[7][8]
The valley's aquifers were also in danger of being ruined by saltwater infiltration. Local reservoirs were built to provide water for an aggressive groundwater recharge program. While simultaneously dealing with the demands of growing cities, the water district finally managed to stop further sinking by the 1980s. Vasona and Lexington reservoirs were part of the effort.

Habitat and wildlife

California golden beaver family on upper Los Gatos Creek
Chinook salmon spawning on Los Gatos Creek in 1996 by U. S. Highway 17.
Pacific-slope flycatchers, tree swallows, owls
, etc.
Beaver and dam on lower Los Gatos Creek, tributary to the Guadalupe River, courtesy of South Bay Clean Creeks Coalition.

Only five fish species were documented historically in the Guadalupe River watershed including rainbow trout, Sacramento sucker, roach, prickly sculpin, and three-spined stickleback (in brackish ponds and sloughs near the bay).

California Department of Fish and Game
document stated that substantial steelhead runs had not been seen in Los Gatos Creek since 1937, when agricultural pumps lowered the water table throughout the Santa Clara Valley and dewatered the lower reach. However, Central California Coast steelhead/rainbow trout populations remain in the portions of the watershed today.

Today, Chinook salmon (Oncorhynchus tshawytscha) migrate up the Guadalupe River and Los Gatos Creek from San Francisco Bay. Both Chinook and steelhead have been spotted as far up the creek as Hamilton Avenue (see inset photo). Chinook salmon arrived in the Guadalupe River watershed (which includes Los Gatos Creek) as Central Valley hatchery strays in the 1980s. While a 1992-1994 genetic study of 29 fish claimed that some had haplotypes not found in Central Valley wild or hatchery salmon, but found in the Russian River,[11] it was later determined that the methodology used was insufficient and provided inaccurate results. Chinook salmon in the Guadalupe River are closely related to Central Valley fall-run Chinook with a genetic affinity to the Feather River hatchery and genetically differentiated from coastal populations.[12]

Between Lake Elsman and Lexington Reservoir, the creek is pristine and closed to the public. Here, along with rainbow trout,

puma (Puma concolor) are extant. The beaver were restocked to the portion of Los Gatos Creek where it enters Lexington Reservoir sometime before spring 1992, and recently, a beaver reportedly served as "a hearty meal" for a local mountain lion.[13] Historical evidence of beaver in the area includes reference by Captain John Sutter who around 1840 recorded that 1,500 beaver pelts were sold "at a trifling value" by the Indians to Mission San José, the latter only 25 miles from the town of Los Gatos.[14] Physical proof of golden beaver in south San Francisco Bay tributaries is a Castor canadensis subauratus skull in the Smithsonian Institution National Museum of Natural History collected by zoologist James Graham Cooper in Santa Clara, California on Dec. 31, 1855.[15] Cooper lived in Mountain View, California from October to December 1855 and collected most of his specimens on Saratoga Creek (then "Quito Creek").[16]

Osprey (Pandion haliaetus) began to re-colonize the watershed after at least a 150-year absence with documentation of nesting sites in 2004.[17]

Watershed

The Los Gatos Creek sub watershed drains 55.1 square miles (143 km2).

Willow Glen Los Gatos Creek is joined by Dry Creek (left) then, after crossing Interstate 280, El Camino Real and The Alameda, it joins the Guadalupe River
in the Guadalupe River Park.

Recreation

The

Vasona Park, one of the most popular parks in the Santa Clara County parks system. The Los Gatos Creek Park
is located in Campbell, a city that is bisected by Los Gatos Creek.

See also

References

  1. ^
    ISBN 1-884995-14-4
    .
  2. ^ a b c U.S. Geological Survey Geographic Names Information System: Los Gatos Creek
  3. ^ "Moody Gulch". Geographic Names Information System. United States Geological Survey, United States Department of the Interior.
  4. ^ Wiley, Neil. "Lake Elsman". Mountain Network News. Mountain Network News. Retrieved 23 February 2012.
  5. ^ "Guadalupe Watershed". Santa Clara Valley Urban Runoff Pollution Program. Retrieved 2010-11-14.
  6. ISBN 0-9641102-1-0
    .
  7. ^ "Measuring Land Subsidence From Space, USGS Fact Sheet-051-00". U. S. Geological Survey. April 2000. Retrieved November 5, 2009.
  8. ISBN 0-520-23629-7
    .
  9. ^ John Otterbein Snyder. "Notes on the Fishes of the Streams Flowing into San Francisco Bay, California". Department of Commerce and Labor Report of the Bureau of Fisheries 1904. Washington Government Printing Office 1905.
  10. ^ John Otterbein Snyder. "Water Storage in Santa Clara County". Biennial Report Fish and Game Commission 1934 V20(2).
  11. ^ Nielsen, J. L. (1995). Mitochondrial DNA Frequency Distributions in Chinook Salmon from the Sacramento-San Joaquin Basin and Guadalupe River 1992-1994, California Department of Fish and Game Technical Report FG 2081 IF (Report). Sacramento, California and Monterey, California: California Department of Fish and Game, Anadromous Fisheries Division and Hopkins Marine Station, Stanford University.
  12. ^ Garcia-Rossi, Dino and Dennis Hedgecock (2002). Provenance Analysis of Chinook Salmon (Oncorhynchus tshawytscha) in the Santa Clara Valley Watershed (Report).
  13. ^ Lisa M. Krieger (Oct 5, 2009). "Tracking the big cats". San Jose Mercury News. Retrieved Nov 25, 2009.
  14. ISBN 0-520-24851-1
    . beaver.
  15. ^ "Castor canadensis subauratus USNM 580354". Smithsonian National Museum of Natural History. Retrieved 2013-04-22.
  16. ISBN 978-0-89301-071-3
    .
  17. ISBN 978-0-9796038-0-8
    .
  18. ^ TetraTech, Inc. (2005-05-20). Guadalupe River Watershed Mercury TMDL Project (PDF) (Report). Retrieved 2014-07-20.

External links

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