1.
Kings Canyon National Park
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Kings Canyon National Park is a national park in the southern Sierra Nevada, east of Fresno, California. The park was established in 1940 and covers 461,901 acres and it incorporated General Grant National Park, established in 1890 to protect the General Grant Grove of giant sequoias. The park is north of and contiguous with Sequoia National Park and they were designated the UNESCO Sequoia-Kings Canyon Biosphere Reserve in 1976. Humans have inhabited the area for thousands of years, the first Native Americans in the area were Paiute peoples, who moved into the region from their ancestral home east of Mono Lake. The Paiute Nation people used deer and other animals for food. They created trade routes that extended down the slope of the Sierra into the Owens Valley. Kings Canyon had been known to white settlers since the mid-19th century, then United States Secretary of the Interior Harold Ickes fought to create the Kings Canyon National Park. He hired Ansel Adams to photograph and document this among other parks, the bill combined the General Grant Grove with the backcountry beyond Zumwalt Meadow. Kings Canyons future was in doubt for nearly fifty years, some wanted to build a dam at the western end of the valley, while others wanted to preserve it as a park. The debate was settled in 1965, when the valley, along with Tehipite Valley, was added to the park, Kings Canyon National Park consists of two sections. The parks Giant Sequoia forests are part of 202,430 acres of old-growth forests shared by Sequoia and this section of the park is mostly mixed conifer forest, and is readily accessible via paved highways. Both the South and Middle Forks of the Kings Rivers have extensive glacial canyons, one portion of the South Fork canyon, known as the Kings Canyon, gives the entire park its name. Kings Canyon, with a depth of 8,200 feet, is one of the deepest canyons in the United States. The canyon was carved by glaciers out of granite, the Kings Canyon, and its developed area, Cedar Grove, is the only portion of the main part of the park that is accessible by motor vehicle. Both the Kings Canyon and its Middle Fork twin, Tehipite Valley, are deeply incised, U-shaped glacial gorges with relatively flat floors and towering granite cliffs thousands of feet high. In addition, the canyon has several systems, one of which is Boyden Cave. To the east of the canyons are the peaks of the Sierra Crest, which attain an elevation of 14,248 feet NAVD88 at the summit of North Palisade. This is classic high Sierra country, barren ridges and glacially scoured lake-filled basins
2.
Shoshone
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The Shoshone were sometimes called the Snake Indians by neighboring tribes and early American explorers. Their peoples have become members of recognized tribes throughout their traditional areas of settlement, often colocated with the Paiute. The name Shoshone comes from Sosoni, a Shoshone word for high-growing grasses, some neighboring tribes call the Shoshone Grass House People, based on their traditional homes made from soshoni. Shoshones call themselves Newe, meaning People, meriwether Lewis recorded the tribe as the Sosonees or snake Indians in 1805. The Shoshoni language is spoken by approximately 1,000 people today and it belongs to the Central Numic branch of the Uto-Aztecan language family. Speakers are scattered from central Nevada to central Wyoming, the largest numbers of Shoshoni speakers live on the federally recognized Duck Valley Indian Reservation, located on the border of Nevada and Idaho, and Goshute Reservation in Utah. Idaho State University also offers Shoshoni-language classes, the Shoshone are a Native American tribe, who originated in the western Great Basin and spread north and east into present-day Idaho and Wyoming. By 1500, some Eastern Shoshone had crossed the Rocky Mountains into the Great Plains, after 1750, warfare and pressure from the Blackfoot, Crow, Lakota, Cheyenne, and Arapaho pushed Eastern Shoshone south and westward. Some of them moved as far south as Texas, emerging as the Comanche by 1700, as more European-American settlers migrated west, tensions rose with the indigenous people over competition for territory and resources. Wars occurred throughout the half of the 19th century. The Northern Shoshone, led by Chief Pocatello, fought during the 1860s with settlers in Idaho, as more settlers encroached on Shoshone hunting territory, the natives raided farms and ranches for food, and attacked immigrants. The warfare resulted in the Bear River Massacre, when US forces attacked and killed an estimated 410 Northwestern Shoshone, a large number of the dead were civilians, including women and children, deliberately killed by the soldiers. This was the highest number of deaths which the Shoshone suffered at the hands of United States forces, allied with the Bannock, to whom they were related, the Shoshone fought against the United States in the Snake War from 1864 to 1868. They fought US forces together in 1878 in the Bannock War, in 1876, by contrast, the Shoshone fought alongside the U. S. Army in the Battle of the Rosebud against their traditional enemies, the Lakota and Cheyenne. In 1879 a band of approximately 300 Eastern Shoshone became involved in the Sheepeater Indian War and it was the last Indian war fought in the Pacific Northwest region of the present-day United States. In 1911 a small group of Bannock under a leader named Mike Daggett, also known as Shoshone Mike, killed four ranchers in Washoe County, the settlers formed a posse and went out after the Native Americans. They caught up with the Bannock band on February 26,1911 and they lost one man of the posse, Ed Hogle. The posse captured three children and a woman, a rancher donated the partial remains of three adult males, two adult females, two adolescent males, and three children to the Smithsonian Institution in Washington, DC for study
3.
Yokuts
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The Yokuts are an ethnic group of Native Americans native to central California. Before European contact, the Yokuts consisted of up to 60 tribes speaking the same language, conventional sub-groupings include the Foothill Yokuts, Northern Valley Yokuts, and Southern Valley Yokuts. In the northern half of the Yokuts region, there were some tribes inhabiting the foothills of the Coast Range, there is evidence of Yokuts inhabiting the Carrizo Plain and creating rock art in the Painted Rock area. Estimates for the populations of most native groups in California have varied substantially. Alfred L. Kroeber in 1925 put the 1770 population of the Yokut at 18,000, several subsequent investigators suggested that the total should be substantially higher. Robert F. Heizer and Albert B, elsasser 1980 suggested that the Yokut had numbered about 70,000. They had one of the highest regional population densities in pre-contact North America, the numbers of Foothill Yokut were reduced by around 93% between 1850 and 1900. A few Valley Yokut remain, the most prominent tribe among them being the Tachi, Kroeber estimated the population of the Yokut in 1910 as 600. Today there are about 2000 enrolled Yokut in the federally recognized tribe and 600 more Yokut belonging to unrecognized tribes, the Yokutsan language is a member of the Penutian language family. In the autumn of 2014, several disenrolled Chukchansi tribe members arrived at the Chukchansi Gold Resort & Casino armed with guns, as a result, a federal judge ordered that the casino be shut down. Estanislao Yokuts traditional narratives Thomas Jefferson Mayfield Kroeber, A. L.1910, on the Evidences of Occupation of Certain Regions by the Miwok Tribes, University of California Press, Berkeley, Vol.6 No.3 p.370 Kroeber, A. L.1925. Handbook of the Indians of California, bureau of American Ethnology Bulletin No.78. A Native American Encyclopedia, History, Culture, and Peoples, the Natural World of the California Indians, University of California Press, Berkeley. University of California Publications in American Archaeology and Ethnology 49, 155–236, the Aboriginal Population of the San Joaquin Valley, California. The Tache-Yokuts, Indians of the San Joaquin Valley, Heizer, Robert F. and Albert B. The Natural World of the California Indians, indian Linguistic Families Of America, North Of Mexico, Government Printing Office, Washington, pages 90–91. In California, edited by Robert F. Heizer, pp. 448–469, Handbook of North American Indians, William C. Tachi and Tammukan, in Handbook of American Indians North of Mexico, Government Printing Office
4.
Giant Forest
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The Giant Forest, famed for its giant sequoia trees, is within Sequoia National Park. This montane forest, situated at over 6,000 feet above sea level in the western Sierra Nevada of California. The Giant Forest is the most accessible of all giant sequoia groves, five of the ten most massive trees on the planet are located within the Giant Forest. The largest of these, the General Sherman tree, measures 36.5 feet across the base, the giant sequoia tree is the most massive species of tree on earth, and one of just five tree species documented to grow to 300 feet in height. It is also among the longest-lived of all trees on the planet, Giant Forest is close to Crystal Cave, Moro Rock and Crescent Meadow. The western trailhead of the High Sierra Trail which crosses the Sierra Nevada to Mount Whitney is at the Crescent Meadow parking area, ponderosa, Jeffrey, Sugar, and Lodgepole pine trees are common here, as well as white and red fir. Visitors often see deer, Douglas squirrel, and American black bear. The National Park Service warns visitors not to any food in unattended vehicles because bears may break in to steal food. The giant sequoia trees are first encountered on the approach from the south at Giant Forest Village - a small cluster of buildings that is dwarfed by the surrounding trees. The sequoia forest extends mainly east of the village, and is accessed by a 3-mile side road plus many interconnecting foot trails and these range from 1 to 5 miles in length, leading to various named individual trees and clusters of particular importance. These provide the only real hazard - the paths are generally quite level, Once the home of nearly 300 buildings, the region now has four, with no commercial activity. It is a day use area. The Giant Forest Lodge Historic District was designated in 1978, encompassing the area of development in the Giant Forest grove. The area within the grove was restored to natural conditions, allowing the use of fire for forest management. The forest can be reached from Fresno by State Route 180 or from Visalia by State Route 198, the Generals Highway connects Giant Forest to Kings Canyon National Park and the General Grant Grove, home to the General Grant tree among other giant sequoias. It has a volume of 52,508 cubic feet, the top of the Sherman is a dead limb that at one time served as a leader branch. Its largest limb is around 7 feet in diameter, the second-largest tree in the world, the General Grant, is located about 27 miles away in Kings Canyon National Park. Chief Sequoyah, Just uphill from the President tree is the massive and this tree is one of the most startlingly rugged trees in the forest
5.
Conservation movement
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The early conservation movement included fisheries and wildlife management, water, soil conservation and sustainable forestry. Some say the movement is part of the broader and more far-reaching environmental movement. Chiefly in the United States, conservation is seen as differing from environmentalism in that it aims to preserve natural resources expressly for their sustainable use by humans. The conservation movement can be traced back to John Evelyns work Sylva, published as a book two years later, it was one of the most highly influential texts on forestry ever published. The field developed during the 18th century, especially in Prussia and these methods were first applied rigorously in British India from the early-19th century. This early ecological idea was in order to preserve the growth of teak trees. The first forestry officer was appointed in 1806 to regulate and preserve the trees necessary for shipbuilding and this promising start received a setback in the 1820s and 30s, when laissez-faire economics and complaints from private landowners brought these early conservation attempts to an end. Conservation was revived in the century, with the first practical application of scientific conservation principles to the forests of India. Edward Percy Stebbing warned of desertification of India and this was the first case of state management of forests in the world. These local attempts gradually received more attention by the British government as the unregulated felling of trees continued unabated, in 1850, the British Association in Edinburgh formed a committee to study forest destruction at the behest of Dr. Hugh Cleghorn a pioneer in the nascent conservation movement. He had become interested in forest conservation in Mysore in 1847, in the same year, Cleghorn organised the Madras Forest Department and in 1860 the Department banned the use shifting cultivation. Cleghorns 1861 manual, The forests and gardens of South India, in 1861, the Forest Department extended its remit into the Punjab. Sir Dietrich Brandis, a German forester, joined the British service in 1856 as superintendent of the forests of Pegu division in eastern Burma. During that time Burmas teak forests were controlled by militant Karen tribals and he introduced the taungya system, in which Karen villagers provided labour for clearing, planting and weeding teak plantations. After seven years in Burma, Brandis was appointed Inspector General of Forests in India and he formulated new forest legislation and helped establish research and training institutions. The Imperial Forest School at Dehradun was founded by him, germans were prominent in the forestry administration of British India. As well as Brandis, Berthold Ribbentrop and Sir William P. D, schlich brought new methods to Indian conservation, the latter becoming the Inspector-General in 1883 after Brandis stepped down. Schlich helped to establish the journal Indian Forester in 1874, and he authored the five-volume Manual of Forestry on silviculture, forest management, forest protection, and forest utilisation, which became the standard and enduring textbook for forestry students
6.
John Muir
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His letters, essays, and books describing his adventures in nature, especially in the Sierra Nevada, have been read by millions. His activism has helped to preserve the Yosemite Valley, Sequoia National Park, the Sierra Club, which he founded, is a prominent American conservation organization. The 211-mile John Muir Trail, a trail in the Sierra Nevada, was named in his honor. Other such places include Muir Woods National Monument, Muir Beach, John Muir College, Mount Muir, in Scotland, the John Muir Way, a 130-mile-long route, was named in honor of him. In his later life, Muir devoted most of his time to the preservation of the Western forests and he petitioned the U. S. Congress for the National Park bill that was passed in 1890, establishing Yosemite National Park. The spiritual quality and enthusiasm toward nature expressed in his writings has inspired readers, including presidents and congressmen, today Muir is referred to as the Father of the National Parks and the National Park Service has produced a short documentary about his life. John Muir has been considered an inspiration to both Scots and Americans, Muirs biographer, Steven J. Holmes, believes that Muir has become one of the patron saints of twentieth-century American environmental activity, both political and recreational. As a result, his writings are discussed in books and journals. Muir has profoundly shaped the very categories through which Americans understand and envision their relationships with the natural world, on April 21,2013, the first ever John Muir Day was celebrated in Scotland, which marked the 175th anniversary of his birth, paying homage to the conservationist. John Muirs Birthplace is a stone house in Dunbar, East Lothian. His parents were Daniel Muir and Ann Gilrye and he was the third of eight children, Margaret, Sarah, David, Daniel, Ann and Mary, and the American-born Joanna. His earliest recollections were of taking short walks with his grandfather when he was three, author Amy Marquis notes that he began his love affair with nature while young, and implies that it may have been in reaction to his strict religious upbringing. His father believed that anything that distracted from Bible studies was frivolous, but the young Muir was a restless spirit and especially prone to lashings. As a young boy, Muir became fascinated with the East Lothian landscape and it was during this time that he became interested in natural history and the works of Scottish naturalist Alexander Wilson. Although he spent the majority of his life in America, Muir never forgot his roots in Scotland and he held a strong connection with his birthplace and Scottish identity throughout his life and was frequently heard talking about his childhood spent amid the East Lothian countryside. He greatly admired the works of Thomas Carlyle and poetry of Robert Burns and he returned to Scotland on a trip in 1893, where he met one of his Dunbar schoolmates and visited the places of his youth that were etched in his memory. He also never lost his strong Scottish accent after many years living in America, in 1849, Muirs family immigrated to the United States, starting a farm near Portage, Wisconsin, called Fountain Lake Farm. It has been designated a National Historic Landmark, by age 11, young Muir had learned to recite by heart and by sore flesh all of the New Testament and most of the Old Testament
7.
Yosemite National Park
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Yosemite National Park is a national park spanning portions of Tuolumne, Mariposa and Madera counties in Northern California. The park, which is managed by the National Park Service, on average, about 4 million people visit Yosemite each year, and most spend the majority of their time in the seven square miles of Yosemite Valley. The park set a record in 2016, surpassing 5 million visitors for the first time in its history. Almost 95% of the park is designated wilderness, Yosemite was central to the development of the national park idea. First, Galen Clark and others lobbied to protect Yosemite Valley from development, Yosemite is one of the largest and least fragmented habitat blocks in the Sierra Nevada, and the park supports a diversity of plants and animals. The park has a range from 2,127 to 13,114 feet and contains five major vegetation zones, chaparral/oak woodland, lower montane forest, upper montane forest, subalpine zone. Of Californias 7,000 plant species, about 50% occur in the Sierra Nevada, there is suitable habitat for more than 160 rare plants in the park, with rare local geologic formations and unique soils characterizing the restricted ranges many of these plants occupy. The geology of the Yosemite area is characterized by granitic rocks, about 10 million years ago, the Sierra Nevada was uplifted and then tilted to form its relatively gentle western slopes and the more dramatic eastern slopes. The uplift increased the steepness of stream and river beds, resulting in formation of deep, about one million years ago, snow and ice accumulated, forming glaciers at the higher alpine meadows that moved down the river valleys. Ice thickness in Yosemite Valley may have reached 4,000 feet during the early glacial episode, the downslope movement of the ice masses cut and sculpted the U-shaped valley that attracts so many visitors to its scenic vistas today. The name Yosemite originally referred to the name of a tribe which was driven out of the area by the Mariposa Battalion. Before then the area was called Ahwahnee by indigenous people, as revealed by archeological finds, the Yosemite Valley has been inhabited for nearly 3,000 years, though humans may have first visited the area as long as 8,000 to 10,000 years ago. The indigenous natives called themselves the Ahwahneechee, meaning dwellers in Ahwahnee and they are related to the Northern Paiute and Mono tribes. Many tribes visited the area to trade, including nearby Central Sierra Miwoks, a major trading route went over Mono Pass and through Bloody Canyon to Mono Lake, just to the east of the Yosemite area. Vegetation and game in the region were similar to that present today, acorns were a staple to their diet, as well as seeds and plants, salmon. In 1851 as part of the Mariposa Wars intended to suppress Native American resistance and he was pursuing forces of around 200 Ahwahneechee led by Chief Tenaya. Accounts from this battalion were the first well-documented reports of ethnic Europeans entering Yosemite Valley, attached to Savages unit was Dr. Lafayette Bunnell, the company physician, who later wrote about his awestruck impressions of the valley in The Discovery of the Yosemite. Bunnell is credited with naming Yosemite Valley, based on his interviews with Chief Tenaya, Bunnell wrote that Chief Tenaya was the founder of the Pai-Ute Colony of Ah-wah-nee
8.
Visalia, California
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The population was 130,104 at the 2015 census. Visalia is the 5th largest city in the San Joaquin Valley after Fresno, Bakersfield, Stockton and Modesto, the 44th most populous in California, and 198th in the United States. As the county seat of Tulare County, Visalia serves as the economic, Yosemite, Sequoia, and Kings Canyon National Parks are located in the nearby Sierra Nevada mountains, the highest mountain range in the contiguous United States. The area around Visalia was first settled by the Yokuts and Mono Native American tribes thousands of years ago and it is unknown when the first Europeans arrived, but the first to make a written record of the area was Pedro Fages in 1722. When California achieved statehood in 1850, Tulare County did not exist, the land that is now Tulare County was part of the huge County of Mariposa. In 1852, some settled in the area, then called Four Creeks. The area got its name from the many watershed creeks and rivers flowing from the Sierra Nevada Mountains, all the water resulted in a widespread swampy area with a magnificent oak forest. The industrious group of settlers petitioned the legislature for county status and on July 10 of that same year. One of the first inhabitants of a built by the settlers was Nathaniel Vise. Nathaniel was responsible for surveying the new settlement, in November 1852, he wrote, The town contains from 60-80 inhabitants,30 of whom are children of school age. The town is located one of the subdivisions of the Kaweah River and is destined to be the county seat of Tulare. In 1853, that became a reality and Visalia has remained the county seat since that time. Visalia is named for Nathaniel Vises ancestral home, Visalia, Kentucky, early growth in Visalia can be attributed in part to the gold rush along the Kern River. The gold fever brought many transient miners through Visalia along the way, in 1859 Visalia was added to John Butterfields Overland Stage route from St. Louis, Missouri to San Francisco. A plaque commemorating the location can be found at 116 East Main Street, included in the early crop of citizens were some notorious and nasty individuals who preyed upon the travelers along the Butterfield Stage route. Many saloons and hotels sprouted up around the stage stop downtown, the next memorable event was the arrival of the telegraph in 1860. Visalians then could get information of the events taking place on the East Coast which would ultimately develop into the American Civil War. During the Civil War, many citizens of Visalia couldnt decide whether Visalia should stand on the side of the North or the South, no one really knows the outcome of the war, but apparently it was concluded to the satisfaction of the participants and life returned to normal
9.
National Park Service
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It was created on August 25,1916, by Congress through the National Park Service Organic Act and is an agency of the United States Department of the Interior. As of 2014, the NPS employs 21,651 employees who oversee 417 units, the National Park Service celebrated its centennial in 2016. National parks and national monuments in the United States were originally individually managed under the auspices of the Department of the Interior, the movement for an independent agency to oversee these federal lands was spearheaded by business magnate and conservationist Stephen Mather, as well as J. Horace McFarland. With the help of journalist Robert Sterling Yard, Mather ran a publicity campaign for the Department of the Interior and they wrote numerous articles that praised the scenic and historic qualities of the parks and their possibilities for educational, inspirational, and recreational benefits. This campaign resulted in the creation of a National Park Service, Mather became the first director of the newly formed NPS. On March 3,1933, President Herbert Hoover signed the Reorganization Act of 1933, the act would allow the President to reorganize the executive branch of the United States government. It wasnt until later that summer when the new President, Franklin D. Roosevelt, President Roosevelt agreed and issued two Executive orders to make it happen. In 1951, Conrad Wirth became director of the National Park Service, the demand for parks after the end of the World War II had left the parks overburdened with demands that could not be met. In 1952, with the support of President Dwight D. Eisenhower, he began Mission 66, New parks were added to preserve unique resources and existing park facilities were upgraded and expanded. In 1966, as the Park Service turned 50 years old, emphasis began to turn from just saving great and wonderful scenery, Director George Hartzog began the process with the creation of the National Lakeshores and then National Recreation Areas. Since its inception in 1916, the National Park Service has managed each of the United States national parks, Yellowstone National Park was the first national park in the United States. In 1872, there was no government to manage it. Yosemite National Park began as a park, the land for the park was donated by the federal government to the state of California in 1864 for perpetual conservation. Yosemite was later returned to federal ownership, at first, each national park was managed independently, with varying degrees of success. In Yellowstone, the staff was replaced by the U. S. Army in 1886. Due to the irregularities in managing these national treasures, Stephen Mather petitioned the government to improve the situation. In response, Secretary of the Interior Franklin K. Lane challenged him to lobby for creating a new agency, Mather was successful with the ratification of the National Park Service Organic Act in 1916. Later, the agency was given authority over other protected areas, the National Park System includes all properties managed by the National Park Service
10.
Kings River (California)
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The Kings River is a major river of south-central California. About 125 miles long, it drains an area of the high western Sierra Nevada, the headwaters originate at elevations of above 13,000 feet along the Sierra crest, in and around Kings Canyon National Park. Further west in the foothills, the river is impounded in Pine Flat Lake, before flowing into the Central Valley south of Fresno, the Kings River was named by the commander of a Spanish military expedition into the Central Valley in 1805. A large alluvial fan has formed where the gradient decreases in the Central Valley so the river divides into distributaries. Tulare Lake was formerly one of the largest freshwater lakes in western North America and it arises in the Sierra Nevada, consisting of three forks. The Middle and South Forks start in Kings Canyon National Park, the South Fork flows in Kings Canyon, a spectacular 8, 000-foot deep glacial valley. The forks join in the foothills of the Sierra Nevada in Fresno County, California, from that point, the Kings River flows about 125 miles to the Tulare Lake bed, with a surface elevation at 56 m, near Stratford, California. In the foothills, the water from the river is impounded at Pine Flat Dam, in the Central Valley, the river flows south of Fresno, California, where its water is diverted for agriculture. The river splits into Cole Slough and the Old Kings River at the Peoples Weir, the largest weir in the Kings River system. The Old River was the course of the river until two floods in 1861 and 1867, the first of which created Cole Slough and the second of which caused it to become the rivers new main course. Since then the Old River has been dry except when river flows are exceptionally high, dutch John Cut diverges from Cole Slough and joins the Old River to reform the main channel of the Kings River. Cole Slough is then diverted into several canals in the vicinity of Laton. The river system between Peoples Weir and Laton is collectively known as the Kings River Complex, the Kings River splits six miles north of Lemoore into a set of North and South Fork distributaries. These forks join again nearly five miles west of Lemoore, Clarks Fork distributary splits off from the South Fork and flows 5.5 miles to join the returning North Fork distributary. The river flows through a channel into the normally dry Tulare Lake bed about ten miles south of Stratford. In the middle of the San Joaquin Valley, the Kings River divides into North Fork Distributary, South Fork Distributary, the Kings River was named by Lieutenant Gabriel Moraga on one of the first expeditions by the Spanish to the Central Valley of California on January 6,1805. The river was originally named Rio de los Santos Reyes to honor the Biblical Magi, jedediah Smith named it the Kimmel-che or Wimmel-che after a tribe of Indians of that name who reside on it. On the valley floor the Kings River is responsible for groundwater recharge
11.
Kern River
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The Kern River is a river in the U. S. state of California, approximately 165 miles long. It drains an area of the southern Sierra Nevada mountains northeast of Bakersfield, fed by snowmelt near Mount Whitney, the river passes through scenic canyons in the mountains and is a popular destination for whitewater rafting and kayaking. It is the major river in the Sierra Nevada mountain range that drains in a southerly direction. Buena Vista Lake, when overflowing, first backed up into Kern Lake and then upon rising higher drained into Tulare Lake via Buena Vista Slough, the lakes were part of a partially endorheic basin that sometimes overflowed into the San Joaquin River. This basin also included the Kaweah and Tule Rivers, as well as southern distributaries of the Kings that all flowed into Tulare Lake, the lakes were created in 1973 for recreational use. The lakes hold 6,800 acre·ft combined, crops are grown in the rest of the former lakebed. In extremely wet years the river will reach the Tulare Lake basin through a series of sloughs, despite its remote source, nearly all of the river is publicly accessible. The Kern River is particularly popular for hiking and whitewater rafting. The Upper Kern River is paralleled by trails to within a half-mile of its source, even with the presence of Lake Isabella, the river is perennial down to the lower Tulare Basin. Its swift flow at low elevation makes the river below the reservoir an extremely popular location for rafting, the Kern River is the southernmost river in the San Joaquin Valley. It begins in the Sierra Nevada on the side of Tulare County. The main branch of the river rises from small lakes west of Mount Whitney in the high Sierra Nevada mountains in northeastern Tulare County. It flows south through the mountains, passing through Inyo and Sequoia national forests, the Little Kern River joins from the northwest at a site called Forks of the Kern. At Kernville the river emerges from its narrow canyon into a valley where it is impounded in Lake Isabella. The area was known as Whiskey Flat, the former location of the town of Kernville. The South Fork Kern River joins in Lake Isabella, like the North Fork, the South Fork rises in Tulare County and flows mainly south, through Inyo National Forest. After entering Kern County the South Fork curves to the west, despite being dammed upstream, this part of the river has remarkably swift flow even in the driest summers. In Bakersfield proper, the river loses most of its remaining flow, in this region near Bakersfield the Kern River once spread out into vast wetlands and seasonal lakes
12.
Kaweah River
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The Kaweah River is an approximately 58. 5-mile -long river in the U. S. state of California. It rises in four major forks in the Sierra Nevada within Sequoia National Park, flowing southwest through the Lake Kaweah reservoir, formerly the river continued southwest to empty into Tulare Lake, the terminal sink of an endorheic basin in the southern Central Valley. However, the river is diverted for irrigation water. The foothills of the Sierra around the Kaweah River were once inhabited by the Yokuts people, the name Kaweah is thought to mean crow or raven cry in the Yokuts language. Shoshonean people from the Great Basin later settled in the valleys of the Kaweahs forks. In the 1870s, a silver boom took place in the Mineral King valley of the rivers East Fork. The majority of the Kaweahs headwaters above the Central Valley became part of Sequoia National Park in 1890, the southeastern part of the rivers watershed also became part of the park in the 1970s after a failed proposal for a massive ski resort. The Kaweah River is now a destination for hiking, fishing. There are five primary forks to the Kaweah River, the Middle Fork, East Fork, North Fork, South Fork and Marble Fork, the river flows west through a canyon, past Moro Rock and paralleling State Route 198, more commonly known as the Generals Highway. The highway crosses the river between the confluence with Paradise Creek and the Marble Fork and it receives the Marble Fork from the right, forming the Kaweah River proper. Further downstream it receives the East Fork from the left near the town of Three Rivers, the river continues southwest to the confluence with the North Fork from the right and the South Fork from the left just above Lake Kaweah, the reservoir formed by Terminus Dam. Below the dam, the Kaweah receives Dry Creek from the right then curves south past the town of Lemon Cove entering the San Joaquin Valley, cottonwood Creek joins from the right and Yokohl Creek from the left. At McKays Point Diversion Dam, the distributary St. Johns River splits off from the Kaweah, about 5 miles downstream, Deep Creek splits off to the south, before the Kaweah itself splits into Packwood and Mill Creeks, flowing through the city of Visalia. The water in these forks are largely consumed by irrigation of over 500,000 acres of farmland in the region around Visalia known as the Kaweah Delta. Formerly, the channel of the Kaweah River continued southwest, joining with the Tule River. In high water years, the lake would rise enough to empty into the San Joaquin River, although dams and diversions have largely prevented the river from reaching Tulare Lake since the 1960s, it does reach the lake bed in extremely wet years, such as in 1997. Winter rainstorms in lower elevations of the basin can also lead to very high but fleeting peak flows. The rivers average flow at the U. S. Geological Survey stream gauge near Three Rivers is 554 cu ft/s, with a monthly average of 1,680 cu ft/s in May
