Resilience in a time of drought: building a transferable model for collective action in North Coast watersheds

For thousands of years, an abundance of salmon coincided with the development of numerous human communities in Northern California. When Euro-American settlers arrived the 1800s, water diversions and a slough of other behaviors were introduced, contributing to a steep decline of native salmon populations. Today, cumulative human impacts—coupled with California's extreme drought—have resulted in the degradation of salmon habitat and a decrease in water security for rural residents who rely upon local watercourses for their household and irrigation needs. In Southern Humboldt County on California's North Coast, longer dry seasons and an observable trend toward low water flows in the Mattole River inspired a local land trust called Sanctuary Forest to implement a collaborative watershed restoration effort from 2005-2013, focused on managing water diversions among rural residents. Their strategy for self-governing a common pool resource resulted in measurable improvements in streamflows within their program area and a cultural shift toward watershed stewardship. The objective of this project was to produce a technology transfer guide for stakeholders in North Coast watersheds on how to replicate or scale-out water conservation strategies from one setting to another while accounting for the complex socio-cultural and ecological variables that exist in every populated rural watershed. The guide is based on methods that were employed during the feasibility study for transferring Sanctuary Forest's streamflow improvement strategy to Redwood Creek on the South Fork of the Eel River. Within a participatory action research framework, place attachment and place dependence are emphasized as significant factors that can promote rational behavior among local residents.