The Cache Creek Wilderness is a
accessed 6 March 2009

wilderness area Wilderness or wildlands (usually in the plural), are natural environments on Earth that have not been significantly modified by human activity or any nonurbanized land not under extensive agricultural cultivation. The term has traditionally re ...

located in

Lake County, California Lake County is a county located in the north central portion of the U.S. state of California. As of the 2020 census, the population was 68,163. The county seat is Lakeport. The county takes its name from Clear Lake, the dominant geographic fe ...

. The wilderness was added to the National Wilderness Preservation System when the

United States Congress The United States Congress is the legislature of the federal government of the United States. It is bicameral, composed of a lower body, the House of Representatives, and an upper body, the Senate. It meets in the U.S. Capitol in Washing ...

passed the Northern California Coastal Wild Heritage Wilderness Act in 2006 (Public Law 109-362). In July 2015, the area became part of Berryessa Snow Mountain National Monument. The Department of the Interior's Bureau of Land Management (BLM) is the agency in charge. The centerpiece of the wilderness is Cache Creek, a tributary of the

Sacramento River The Sacramento River ( es, Río Sacramento) is the principal river of Northern California in the United States and is the largest river in California. Rising in the Klamath Mountains, the river flows south for before reaching the Sacramento� ...

(in high rainfall years). Cache Creek is one of two tributaries (Putah Creek is the other) that are the most southerly of the significant east-flowing Coast Range drainages in the Sacramento River hydrologic basin and provides important riparian and fish habitat. More than of Cache Creek is designated a California Wild and Scenic River. The wilderness area is within the larger Cache Creek Natural Area of more than , and has a wide variety of plant and animal life, including a year-round population of bald eagles and California's second-largest herd of rare

endemic Endemism is the state of a species being found in a single defined geographic location, such as an island, state, nation, country or other defined zone; organisms that are indigenous to a place are not endemic to it if they are also found else ...

tule elk The tule elk (''Cervus canadensis nannodes'') is a subspecies of elk found only in California, ranging from the grasslands and marshlands of the Central Valley to the grassy hills on the coast. The subspecies name derives from the tule (), a ...

. Highest elevation point is Brushy Sky High at . A topography of steep, rounded hills, open meadows, cliffs and stream canyons support vegetation of

manzanita Manzanita is a common name for many species of the genus ''Arctostaphylos''. They are evergreen shrubs or small trees present in the chaparral biome of western North America, where they occur from Southern British Columbia and Washington to Or ...

, interior live

oak An oak is a tree or shrub in the genus ''Quercus'' (; Latin "oak tree") of the beech family, Fagaceae. There are approximately 500 extant species of oaks. The common name "oak" also appears in the names of species in related genera, notably ''L ...

, scrub oak, deerbrush,

toyon ''Heteromeles arbutifolia'' (; more commonly by Californian botanists), commonly known as toyon, is a common perennial shrub native to extreme southwest Oregon, California, and the Baja California Peninsula. It is the sole species in the genus ...

, birchleaf mahogany, and

gray pine ''Pinus sabiniana'' (sometimes spelled ''P. sabineana''), with vernacular names including towani pine, foothill pine, gray pine, bull pine, and digger pine, is a pine endemic to California in the United States. Some sources discourage using the n ...

as well as serpentine and chemise chaparral. Streamside vegetation include trees of

willow Willows, also called sallows and osiers, from the genus ''Salix'', comprise around 400 speciesMabberley, D.J. 1997. The Plant Book, Cambridge University Press #2: Cambridge. of typically deciduous trees and shrubs, found primarily on moist so ...

alder Alders are trees comprising the genus ''Alnus'' in the birch family Betulaceae. The genus comprises about 35 species of monoecious trees and shrubs, a few reaching a large size, distributed throughout the north temperate zone with a few sp ...

, and grasses such as

sedge The Cyperaceae are a family of graminoid (grass-like), monocotyledonous flowering plants known as sedges. The family is large, with some 5,500 known species described in about 90 genera, the largest being the "true sedges" genus '' Carex'' ...

and

bulrush Bulrush is a vernacular name for several large wetland grass-like plants *Sedge family (Cyperaceae): **''Cyperus'' **'' Scirpus'' **''Blysmus'' **''Bolboschoenus'' **'' Scirpoides'' **'' Isolepis'' **'' Schoenoplectus'' **'' Trichophorum'' * T ...

. Rare native plants observed in the Cache Creek area include Hall's harmonia, an aromatic annual wildflower, and the adobe lily which are listed by the California Native Plant Society as category 1B-meaning the plant meets all criteria of section 2062 of the California Endangered Species Act. There are significant archaeological sites documented, including the remains of a large Hill

Patwin The Patwin (also Patween, Southern Wintu) are a band of Wintun people native to the area of Northern California. The Patwin comprise the southern branch of the Wintun group, native inhabitants of California since approximately 500 AD. The Patw ...

village occupied around 11,000 years ago. The Cache Creek area has been and continues to be a popular recreation site for a variety of activities including white-water rafting (called the "wilderness run"), bird watching, hiking, backpacking, fishing and

nature photography Nature photography is a wide range of photography taken outdoors and devoted to displaying natural elements such as landscapes, wildlife, plants, and close-ups of natural scenes and textures. Nature photography tends to put a stronger emphasis o ...

. Adjacent to the wilderness is the Cache Creek Wildlife Area that is managed by the

California Department of Fish and Game The California Department of Fish and Wildlife (CDFW), formerly known as the California Department of Fish and Game (CDFG), is a state agency under the California Natural Resources Agency. The Department of Fish and Wildlife manages and protec ...

, Yolo County Parks and Bureau of Land Management. Wildlife species include black-tailed deer, tule elk, wild turkey, quail, rabbit, gray squirrel, dove, pigeon, black bear, raccoon and mountain lion.

Geology

The wilderness is within the upper basin of the Cache Creek drainage area and is composed of

sandstone Sandstone is a clastic sedimentary rock composed mainly of sand-sized (0.0625 to 2 mm) silicate grains. Sandstones comprise about 20–25% of all sedimentary rocks. Most sandstone is composed of quartz or feldspar (both silicates ...

, shale,

chert Chert () is a hard, fine-grained sedimentary rock composed of microcrystalline or cryptocrystalline quartz, the mineral form of silicon dioxide (SiO2). Chert is characteristically of biological origin, but may also occur inorganically as a ...

and conglomerate belonging to the Franciscan group, Upper Jurassic age. These sediments are of marine origin with extensive folding and faulting. In some places, dikes of serpentinized rock are intruded into the sediments. This is overlain by unmetamorphized sandstone and shale of Cretaceous age, also of marine origin and also folded and faulted with thick serpentine rock interbedded. Serpentine rock forms from peridotite that has received intense heat and pressure when down near a subduction zone of Earth's tectonic plates. Geologists believe that the rock then surfaces at these zones because of its lower density than the surrounding rocks. Serpentine soils have high levels of metals such as asbestos, copper, mercury and

magnesium Magnesium is a chemical element with the symbol Mg and atomic number 12. It is a shiny gray metal having a low density, low melting point and high chemical reactivity. Like the other alkaline earth metals (group 2 of the periodic ta ...

, among others, that are toxic to many plants. Some plants have not only adapted, but have evolved to grow almost exclusively in serpentine soils. The

leather oak ''Quercus durata'', commonly known as leather oak, is a species of oak endemic to California, common in the Coast Ranges and the foothills of the Sierra Nevada. The common name "leather oak" is derived from the leathery texture on the lop of its ...

(''Quercus durata'' var. ''durata'') is one example. Many of these serpentine-adapted plants are also

to the state, as this type of soil is not widespread outside of California. Approximately 20% of the state's rare and endemic plants grow in serpentine soils.

Notes

External links

Bureau of Land Management, Cache Creek Natural Area

* ttp://bioregion.ucdavis.edu/book/11_Upper_Cache_Creek/11_01_circ_wilson.html UC Davis bioregion websitesome outdated information, but gives a good description of the general area, plants, wildlife and historic and prehistoric uses. {{authority control Protected areas of Lake County, California Wilderness areas of California Bureau of Land Management areas in California