Elk Creek Wetlands Wildlife Area

Smith River Alliance is excited to announce the preliminary planning phase for the Lower Elk Creek Wetland Enhancement project! This survey offers a chance to share your valuable input. Project goals include improving fish and wildlife habitats, exploring public access options, and enhancing coastal resilience within the lower Elk Creek watershed in Del Norte County. The project area covers 20 acres of the Elk Creek Wetlands Wildlife Area (ECWWA), managed by the California Department of Fish and Wildlife (CDFW).

The Elk Creek Wetlands Wildlife Area is a 120-acre wetland park hiding in plain sight at the south end of Crescent City. The park was established in the 1980s and a one-mile loop trail was built, complete with a dedicated parking area and interpretive signs and kiosks for self-guided nature walks. The trail was popular for some time but fell into disuse over the years.

The wetland park has relic interpretive signs, overgrown trails, and meadows. Just across the street from the wetlands is a well-traveled bike path that runs from here through the fields and playgrounds of Beachfront Park and beyond. It’s easy to see the Elk Creek Wetlands as a natural extension of Beachfront Park. Unfortunately, green spaces across our community are often used as illegal dumping grounds and as resting places for our unhoused population due to disuse and neglect.

Restoring Elk Creek also provides significant benefits for the local community. The wetlands found in Elk Creek provide many ecosystem services. They clean water, protect the city from storm surges and natural disasters, provide habitats for fish and wildlife, and are beautiful places to visit.

Wetland habitat can make Crescent City more resilient to flooding and other natural disasters. That is because a 1-acre wetland can store up to 3 acre-feet of water, thereby reducing flood levels. 

Click here to learn about the Del Norte County Tsunami Hazard Areas!

Projects that improve water quality and enhance fish and wildlife habitat can also build a more climate-resilient community by increasing stormwater infiltration, minimizing impacts from natural disasters, increasing water filtration, and remediating environmental contamination.

Restoration is needed in Elk Creek due to its large urban interface and history of alterations from timber harvest, lumber milling, urban development, and livestock grazing, which have reduced the quantity and quality of habitat for fish and wildlife.

To learn more about projects identified in the Elk Creek watershed, click here.

There are three proposed conceptual design restoration alternatives for the Lower Elk Creek Wetland Enhancement Project:

Thank you for your feedback! For more information on the Elk Creek watershed, please visit: Elk Creek Overview - Smith River Alliance