Corte Madera Creek (Spanish for "a place where wood is cut") is a U.S. Geological Survey. National Hydrography Dataset high-resolution flowline data
The National Map
, accessed March 15, 2011 creek that flows north-northwest to Searsville Dam and then joins with Bear Creek to form

San Francisquito Creek San Francisquito Creek (Spanish for "Little San Francisco" - the "little" referring to size of the settlement compared to Mission San Francisco de Asís) is a creek that flows into southwest San Francisco Bay in California, United States. Histo ...

California California is a U.S. state, state in the Western United States, located along the West Coast of the United States, Pacific Coast. With nearly 39.2million residents across a total area of approximately , it is the List of states and territori ...

History

Historically Corte de Madera Creek ran through the

Rancho Cañada del Corte de Madera Rancho Cañada del Corte de Madera was a Mexican land grant in present day Santa Clara County, California given in 1833 by Governor José Figueroa to José Domingo Peralta and Máximo Martínez. The name translates as "the valley where lumber ...

and

Rancho Corte de Madera Rancho el Corte de Madera was a Mexican land grant in present day Santa Clara County, California given in 1844 by Governor Manuel Micheltorena to Máximo Martínez. The name translates as "the place where lumber is cut". The roughly triangula ...

land grants (the latter surrounding the former).

Ecology

Corte Madera Creek was historically an

anadromous Fish migration is mass relocation by fish from one area or body of water to another. Many types of fish migrate on a regular basis, on time scales ranging from daily to annually or longer, and over distances ranging from a few metres to thousan ...

steelhead Steelhead, or occasionally steelhead trout, is the common name of the anadromous form of the coastal rainbow trout or redband trout (O. m. gairdneri). Steelhead are native to cold-water tributaries of the Pacific basin in Northeast Asia and N ...

(''Oncorhynchus mykiss irideus'') spawning stream; however, access to the creek has been blocked since 1890 by Searsville Dam. Although steelhead can no longer run above Searsville Dam to spawn, stream resident coastal rainbow trout (''O. m. irideus'') populations live in upper Corte Madera Creek and its tributaries. In a 1996 biotic assessment of upper Searsville Lake and the lower floodplain of Corte Madera Creek, Stanford biologists wrote that the native species likely included steelhead/coastal rainbow trout (''Oncorhynchus mykiss irideus''),

sculpin A sculpin is a type of fish that belongs to the superfamily Cottoidea in the order Scorpaeniformes.Kane, E. A. and T. E. Higham. (2012)Life in the flow lane: differences in pectoral fin morphology suggest transitions in station-holding demand a ...

California roach The California roach (''Hesperoleucus symmetricus'') is a cyprinid fish native to western North America and abundant in the intermittent streams throughout central California. Once considered the sole member of its genus, it has recently been sp ...

(''Hesperoleucas symmetricus''), hitch (''Lavinia exilcauda''),

speckled dace The speckled dace (''Rhinichthys osculus''), also known as the spotted dace and the carpita pinta, is a member of the minnow family. It is found in temperate freshwater in North America, from Sonora, Mexico to British Columbia, Canada. Canada ...

(''Rhinichthys osculus''),

Sacramento sucker The Sacramento sucker (''Catostomus occidentalis'') is a species of ray-finned fish in the family Catostomidae. It is primarily found in California with some populations extending into Oregon and Nevada. They inhabit a diverse range of habitats f ...

(''Catostomus occidentalis''), Pacific lamprey (''Entosphenus tridentatus''), and perhaps

three-spined stickleback The three-spined stickleback (''Gasterosteus aculeatus'') is a fish native to most inland and coastal waters north of 30°N. It has long been a subject of scientific study for many reasons. It shows great morphological variation throughout its ra ...

(''Gasterosteus aculeatus''), Sacramento pikeminnow (''Ptychocheilus grandis''),

Sacramento blackfish The Sacramento blackfish (''Orthodon microlepidotus'') is a species of freshwater fish in central California. A cyprinid, the blackfish is the sole member of its genus. Distribution and habitat Blackfish are primarily denizens of the warm and ...

(''Orthodon microlepidontus''), and

coho salmon The coho salmon (''Oncorhynchus kisutch;'' Karuk: achvuun) is a species of anadromous fish in the salmon family and one of the five Pacific salmon species. Coho salmon are also known as silver salmon or "silvers". The scientific species name i ...

(''Oncorhynchus kisutch''). They noted that the only native species observed with any regularity in the study area are Sacramento sucker and rainbow trout, and attributed the now depauperate native fish fauna to dislocation of hydrologic connectivity due to the dam, transformation of the habitat above the dam from

lotic River ecosystems are flowing waters that drain the landscape, and include the Biotic component, biotic (living) interactions amongst plants, animals and micro-organisms, as well as abiotic (nonliving) physical and chemical interactions of its man ...

lentic A lake ecosystem or lacustrine ecosystem includes biotic (living) plants, animals and micro-organisms, as well as abiotic (non-living) physical and chemical interactions. Lake ecosystems are a prime example of lentic ecosystems (''lentic'' re ...

, and the fact that Searsville Reservoir harbors many non-native species of centrarchid fishes ( sunfish,

black bass Black is a color which results from the absence or complete absorption of visible light. It is an achromatic color, without hue, like white and grey. It is often used symbolically or figuratively to represent darkness. Black and white have of ...

, and

crappie Crappies () are two species of North American freshwater fish of the genus ''Pomoxis'' in the family Centrarchidae (sunfishes). Both species of crappies are popular game fish among recreational anglers. Etymology The genus name ''Pomoxis'' ...

) which prey on virtually all historically native fishes. They noted that federally threatened

California red-legged frog The California red-legged frog (''Rana draytonii'') is a species of frog found in California (USA) and northern Baja California (Mexico). It was formerly considered a subspecies of the northern red-legged frog (''Rana aurora''). The frog is an IU ...

s (''Rana draytonii'') occur in the lotic portions of Corte Madera Creek below the dam but not above, likely due to depredation by non-native fish and

American bullfrog The American bullfrog (''Lithobates catesbeianus''), often simply known as the bullfrog in Canada and the United States, is a large true frog native to eastern North America. It typically inhabits large permanent water bodies such as swamps, po ...

s (''Lithobates catesbeiana''). The extent by which Searsville Reservoir serves as a source for non-native species was illustrated when Stanford biologists studied the aquatic fauna found in the plunge pool below the Searsville dam spillway. The plunge pool was drained in 2013 to allow for a safety inspection of the base of the dam. Native species found when the plunge pool was pumped dry include two steelhead trout, 26 California roach and 22 Sacramento suckers. In contrast, more than 1,500 non-native fishes were encountered during the dewatering process, including over 500 sunfish including

green sunfish The green sunfish (''Lepomis cyanellus'') is a species of freshwater fish in the sunfish family (Centrarchidae) of order Perciformes. A panfish popular with anglers, the green sunfish is also kept as an aquarium fish by hobbyists. They are usu ...

(''(Lepomis cyanellus)'',

bluegill The bluegill (''Lepomis macrochirus''), sometimes referred to as "bream", "brim", "sunny", or "copper nose" as is common in Texas, is a species of North American freshwater fish, native to and commonly found in streams, rivers, lakes, ponds and ...

(''Lepomis macrochirus'') and likely

redear sunfish The redear sunfish (''Lepomis microlophus''), also known as the shellcracker, Georgia bream, cherry gill, chinquapin, improved bream, rouge ear sunfish and sun perch) is a freshwater fish in the family Centrarchidae and is native to the southeast ...

(''Lepomis microlophus''), two

bullhead catfish ''Ameiurus'' is a genus of catfishes in the family Ictaluridae. It contains the three common types of bullhead catfish found in waters of the United States, the black bullhead (''Ameiurus melas''), the brown bullhead (''Ameiurus nebulosus''), a ...

(''Ameiurus'' species) and over 1,000

mosquitofish The western Mosquitofish (''Gambusia affinis'') is a North American freshwater fish, also known commonly, if ambiguously, as simply Mosquitofish or by its generic name, ''Gambusia'', or by the common name gambezi. Its sister species, the easte ...

(''Gambusia affinis''). Other non-native in the plunge pool included 500 bullfrogs and 150 Louisiana red swamp crayfish. In the spring of 1991, an adult steelhead (0.74m) was observed jumping at the base of Searsville Dam. In May 2002, the San Francisquito Watershed Council released a barrier survey including Corte Madera Creek. A private bridge apron adjacent to Willowbrook Drive and another downstream of the confluence with Damiani Creek were described as impassable barriers to upstream migrating steelhead. In 2014 a systematic study of 1,400 plus dams in California identified Searsville Dam as a high-priority candidate to improve environmental flows for native fish conservation. Illegal fishing of rainbow trout (stream resident forms of ''O. m. irideus'') has occurred in several places along Corte Madera Creek with significant damage to the surviving populations of native rainbows. In addition, there are also several private ponds stocked with warm water non-native species, such as Smallmouth Bass, Redear Sunfish and Bluegill that threaten the surviving native trout population fry and eggs. The most notable pond is on Iroquois Trail and empties into Corte Madera Creek through a single outlet which floods during El Niño, or a wet winter.

Watershed

Corte Madera Creek has its origin just northeast of Borel Hill in the Coal Creek Open Space Preserve (part of the

Midpeninsula Regional Open Space District Formed in 1972 by voter initiative, the Midpeninsula Regional Open Space District (MROSD) is a non-enterprise special district in the San Francisco Bay Area. It has acquired and preserved a regional green belt of open space land and provides o ...

, and follows Alpine Road northwesterly along the

San Andreas Fault The San Andreas Fault is a continental transform fault that extends roughly through California. It forms the tectonics, tectonic boundary between the Pacific Plate and the North American Plate, and its motion is Fault (geology)#Strike-slip fau ...

to pick up Coal Creek, Rengstorff Gulch, Damiani Creek, Jones Gulch, Hamms Gulch - all draining the northeastern slope of the

Santa Cruz Mountains The Santa Cruz Mountains, part of the Pacific Coast Ranges, are a mountain range in central and Northern California, United States. They form a ridge down the San Francisco Peninsula, south of San Francisco. They separate the Pacific Ocean from ...

. It levels out upon reaching

Portola Valley Portola Valley is a town in San Mateo County, California. Located on the San Francisco Peninsula in the Bay Area, Portola Valley is a small, wealthy community nestled on the eastern slopes of the Santa Cruz Mountains. History Portola Val ...

and crosses under Portola Road at Brookside Drive. Before reaching Searsville Reservoir it arrives in a large ''laguna'' or freshwater marsh formed by the nexus of several creeks, including Westbridge Creek, Sausal Creek, Dennis Martin Creek, and

Alambique Creek Alambique Creek, or ''Arroyo Alembique'', is a U.S. Geological Survey. National Hydrography Dataset high-resolution flowline dataThe National Map, accessed 2012-02-11 stream located in San Mateo County, California, in the United States. It is tr ...

. Just south of the intersection of Mountain Home Road and Portola Road,

enters a historic wetland pond (Lloyd's Pond) which is currently impounded by the road-fill of Portola Road and a culvert. From there Alambique Creek flows under Portola Road into the upper Searsville Reservoir at its confluence with

Sausal Creek The Sausal () is a small mountain range in the southwestern parts of Austria's state Styria. It thrusts up from the northern banks of the Sulm valley, west of the district town of Leibnitz. Its highest point, the summit of the Demmerkogel, rises ...

. Dennis Martin Creek flows into Sausal Creek just upstream of the reservoir area at the Family Farm Road bridge. From there Sausal Creek joins enters Searsville Reservoir. Corte Madera Creek enters Searsville Reservoir further to the east. Old maps suggest that Dennis Martin Creek and Alambique Creek were historically tributary to Sausal Creek. This unique confluence of streams and natural wetlands was submerged and buried with sediment due to the construction of Searsville Dam and the siltation of the reservoir. Below Searsville Dam Corte Madera Creek joins with Bear Creek to form

References

External links

San Francisquito Watershed & Alluvial Fan
at

Oakland Museum of California The Oakland Museum of California or OMCA (formerly the Oakland Museum) is an interdisciplinary museum dedicated to the art, history, and natural science of California, located adjacent to Oak Street, 10th Street, and 11th Street in Oakland, Cali ...

website
Oakland Museum Map of San Francisquito Creek WatershedSan Francisquito Watershed Council
{{Santa Cruz Mountains Rivers of San Mateo County, California Palo Alto, California Santa Cruz Mountains Rivers of Northern California Tributaries of San Francisquito Creek

History

Ecology

Watershed

See also

References

External links