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Exploring the beautiful nature of California


California Nature:  Klamath River


Cascading out of the mountains of southern Oregon, the Klamath River runs free for over 200 miles through the Siskiyou mountains of northern California. Feisty fish and fierce rapids are the calling cards for the Upper Klamath, California’s second-longest river.

Because the Klamath includes many of the longest free-flowing stretches of river in California as well as some of its better whitewater runs, it has become a popular recreational river. Its watershed includes large swathes of the Klamath National Forest and Six Rivers National Forest.

However, time and again, the Klamath has been targeted as a potential water source because of its generous flow, a rarity in most of California. For now, the lower Klamath remains undeveloped, although massive diversions were once proposed to reroute the river into the Central Valley to supplement the region's water supply.
The upper Klamath river has great whitewater rafting available One of the most important anadromous fish rivers on the west coast of North America south of the Columbia River, the Klamath River basin has been inhabited by humans for at least 7,000 years.

Located in the Klamath River valley just north of Mount Shasta, the Middle Klamath is an ideal river trip for first-timers, families with children as young as four, or river veterans looking for solitude and relaxation. In addition to the many Class 2 rapids, you’ll be exploring side creeks, swimming, or floating, in the warm water, and discovering deer and turtles along the riverbank.

The upper Klamath River is a wild, isolated section of the river and slices through the rugged Cascade Mountains of southern Oregon and northern California. With unparalleled wilderness beauty and over 30 major rapids, the Upper Klamath’s “Hell’s Corner Gorge” is one of the west’s finest Class 4 river trips. Just above “Hell’s Corner” the river narrows and steepens, creating a volcanic maze of whitewater.

The Upper Klamath Basin, defined by the drainage area of the Klamath River above Iron Gate Dam, is a unique transitional area between the Cascade Range to the west and the Basin and Range Province of the northern Great Basin to the southeast. This region extends from the southern Lower Klamath Lake area into the Lost River and Upper Klamath Lake basins. Crustal stretching and block faulting created a topography with characteristics similar to both regions. Almost the entire basin is a graben region, bearing basin and range characteristics, formed by uplifting and subsidence along several north-south fault

The Klamath river is considered a prime habitat for Chinook salmon, Coho salmon, steelhead trout, and rainbow trout. Once the third-largest producer of salmon on the West Coast, only a fraction of the river's historic runs remain since the construction of six dams, built between 1908 and 1962. Coho salmon in the Klamath River are listed as threatened under the U.S. Endangered Species Act. In 1963 the largest single tributary to the Klamath, the upper Trinity River, was virtually removed from the Klamath drainage with the completion of the Lewiston and Trinity Dams, diverting 90 percent of the Trinity's flow to the Sacramento Valley.
The klamath river is a beautiful part of California nature Human habitation on the Klamath dates to at least 7,000 years ago. Many of the Native American groups along the river depended on the vast runs of Pacific salmon, second to only that of the Columbia River. These tribes included the Yurok, Hupa, and Karuk along the canyons of the lower river and the Modoc, Klamath and Yahooskin in the arid valleys of the upper basin.

Controlling about 30 miles of the lower Klamath River and a large section of the Northern California Pacific coast, the Yurok were probably the most powerful tribe on the Klamath River and along with the Hupa and Karuk, caught salmon from the river with weirs, basket traps and even harpoons. One well-known ancient fishing ground is Ishi Pishi Falls, a set of rapids on the river near the confluence with the Salmon River. Most of the upstream groups had a nomadic hunting-gathering lifestyle and did not depend on salmon this much. The Klamath River's name was recorded by Europeans in the 19th century derived from the word klamet or the Klamath tribe, but prior to white contact, many names were used to refer to the river, including Ishkêesh and Koke.
A variety of national forests and wildlife preserves, including the Klamath National Forest, Six Rivers National Forest, Klamath National Wildlife Refuges Complex, and Lower Klamath National Wildlife Refuge, are located in the Klamath River watershed. The Klamath National Forest is located in Siskiyou County with a small portion in Oregon, and Six Rivers National Forest is located in the southern Klamath watershed mostly in the Trinity River watershed. The latter two are located in the Upper Klamath Lake - Lower Klamath Lake area. Lava Beds National Monument, which contains a large array of lava tubes and formations, is also in the Lower Klamath Lake area to the south of the remnants of the lake.

Recreational gold mining is popular along the Klamath and some of its tributaries, including the Salmon and Trinity. Although simple methods such as panning are still used, some methods use suction pumps, a practice involving turning over deposits of sediment and spreading them in order to find gold. Debates over the practice, which has further disturbed salmon spawning beds, continue to date
 
 
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