Part 1 | Big Chico Creek

Big Chico Creek: Reconnecting Chinook Salmon With Headwaters

Big Chico Creek is one of the Sacramento Valley’s most important streams for spring-run Chinook salmon and Central Valley steelhead. Originating high in the Sierra-Cascade foothills and flowing through Bidwell Park before joining the Sacramento River, the creek provides valuable cold-water habitat and serves as a vital migration corridor for native fish.

Protecting and restoring connectivity throughout the watershed is essential to supporting resilient fish populations and healthy river ecosystems.

Located on a tributary of Big Chico Creek, the Iron Canyon Fish Passage Project is restoring access to critical upstream habitat that has long been blocked by rockfall and unmaintained infrastructure. The project will reconfigure the creek channel to reconnect spring-run Chinook Salmon and steelhead with over eight miles of over-summering habitat they need to survive and recover. Rather than focusing solely on salmon passage, the project is designed to restore connectivity and habitat for the broader native fish community — an ecosystem-based approach to recovery.

By addressing barriers to migration, the project supports broader efforts to strengthen the resilience of Big Chico Creek and the Sacramento River watershed.

Part 2 | Battle Creek

Battle Creek: California’s Best Opportunity to Restore a Resilient Wild Population of Winter-Run Chinook Salmon

Battle Creek is one of California’s most important cold-water strongholds for salmon and steelhead. Fed by cold springs emerging from the volcanic landscape surrounding Lassen Peak, the watershed provides exceptionally cold, reliable flows that support multiple runs of Chinook salmon and steelhead. Most importantly, Battle Creek represents one of the best opportunities to restore volitional passage for endangered winter-run Chinook salmon, allowing these fish to once again migrate on their own into the cold, spring-fed habitat they need to spawn and survive.

For more than a century, dams and hydropower infrastructure fragmented the watershed and blocked access to much of this high-quality habitat. Today, decades of restoration are gaining momentum. Wildcat Dam was removed in 2010, fish passage through Eagle Canyon was restored in 2021 through a CalTrout-led project, reconnecting more than eight miles of habitat, and in 2025 Inskip Diversion Dam became the second dam removed from Battle Creek. Together, these projects are progressively reconnecting the watershed and demonstrating what is possible as additional barriers are addressed.

CalTrout and our partners are working toward a future where salmon and steelhead can once again move freely between the Sacramento River and Battle Creek’s cold-water headwaters. Restoring this connection could help establish an additional wild population of winter-run Chinook — one of California’s most endangered salmon — while also expanding habitat for spring-run, fall-run, and late-fall-run Chinook salmon and steelhead.

Our work extends beyond fish passage. In the upper watershed, CalTrout is helping advance the removal of remaining hydropower barriers and restore access to cold-water spawning and rearing habitat. Downstream, we are reconnecting floodplains, wetlands, and side channels that provide productive feeding and rearing habitat for juvenile salmon as they begin their migration toward the ocean.

Together, these efforts are restoring Battle Creek as a connected, resilient watershed and moving us closer to one of the most important goals for salmon recovery in California: allowing winter-run Chinook and other native fish to once again complete their life cycle naturally in the cold-water habitats of Battle Creek.