For the past three decades, the Emigrant Wilderness, located just north of Yosemite National Park, has been the site of a dispute over 18 small stone “check dams” built during the first half of the 20th century. On the one hand, pro-dams have been fishermen, nature campers, and advocates seeking to preserve local history. Arguing against them have been environmentalists who believe that a wilderness area should not contain any man-made structures, except perhaps footpaths and the occasional trailhead.
The Emigrant Wilderness, part of the Stanislaus National Forest, encompasses 100 named lakes and about 500 smaller unnamed lakes. It contains miles and miles of streams, the headwaters of the Tuolumne and Stanislaus rivers. But it wasn’t always the fishing paradise it is today.
Shortly after the last wagon trains of emigrants left the mountains near the Sonora Pass in the 1850s, ranchers and sheep herders began grazing their animals on the high grasslands that are now part of the Emigrant Wilderness Area. Finding a shortage of fish in the lakes that dot the region, ranchers began hauling buckets of native fish from lower-elevation lakes and streams and dumping them into alpine lakes.
By the late 1800s, large lakes like Kennedy Lake and Emigrant Lake became popular fishing destinations, drawing sportsmen from nearby Golden Country towns like Sonora and Columbia and from valley cities like Modesto and Stockton. The only major reservoir at the time was Strawberry Lake, today’s Pinecrest Lake. Most of the river and stream fishing was done at low elevations along the Stanislaus and Tuolumne rivers. Because high-rise streams and some lakes tended to dry up in late summer and fall, they did not provide suitable habitat to support fish populations.
Construction of control dams
Around 1900, a local youth named Fred Leighton began working his way up into the highlands near Sonora Pass. He soon realized that if just some of the lakes could be regulated with what he would call “check dams”, more water could be stored in the lakes and then released at a slower rate in early summer during snowmelt. As a result, there would still be a reservoir of water in the lakes when late summer and rainless fall arrived, so that adequate water flow could be maintained to provide habitat for native trout. They would also serve as an early method of flood control.
Beginning in 1920, Leighton and a team of volunteers began building a series of low “check dams” on key lakes. They brought supplies to the highlands on pack animals and built the dams by hand with stones and mortar. They received the full support of the US Forest Service, California Fish and Game, and many local organizations.
The first dam was built on Yellowhammer Lake at the headwaters of Cherry Creek, just two miles north of the Yosemite boundary. Over the years, 17 more dams were built. Most were on lakes, including Lower Buck Lake, Bigelow Lake, Emigrant Lake, Emigrant Meadow Lake, and Huckleberry Lake. Two dams were built along the streams, creating reservoirs to provide summer irrigation water for the prairies. The last pair of dams were built by the Civilian Conservation Corps in 1941.
As a result of the dams, fishing has improved considerably in the region with rainbow, brown, and brook trout populating the waters. Every summer, fishermen flocked to the highlands, bringing pack animals from trails like Pinecrest, Kennedy Meadows, Gianelli’s Cabin.
The Emigrant Desert Designation
The beginning of the end for “check dams” came in 1975 when the region was designated the Emigrant Wilderness. The Wilderness Act of 1964 prohibits virtually any type of man-made structure within the boundaries of a wilderness. Exceptions made for historic structures like early log cabins have been rare. For a while it seemed that “check dams” would fall into the category of historic features. Many of them were eligible to be included in the historical register. Most of them were only a few feet tall and hardly intrusive. Others saw them differently.
The battle over “check dams” continued for decades. In 1988, the Stanislaus National Forest regional forester ordered all dams removed. His decision provoked a public outcry and he changed his position shortly thereafter. Then, in 1991, the Forest Service began developing a Land Resource Management Plan for the area. At the same time, Representative John Doolittle tried, but failed, to get a bill to protect the dams through Congress.
Meanwhile, evidence was mounting that the dams were in desperate need of repair. Some had been smashed, others were just eroding. The spill valves were lost under the silt. Eventually, in 1998, the Forest Service decided to rebuild 8 of the failing dams to keep the stream flowing. But just a year later, the Regional Forester reversed that decision. He held the position that there was no evidence that the dams were necessary. Aerial stocking kept fish levels at an acceptable level.
The decision of the US District Court
The dispute over the “check dams” came to an end in 2006 when Wilderness Watch and other environmental groups sued to stop proposed maintenance of the dams. Both sides argued persuasively. Proponents of the dams pointed to their historical value, their inconspicuous nature, and their benefit to wildlife habitat. Wilderness purists pointed out that there was nothing in the Wilderness Act that would allow such structures within the boundaries of emigrant wilderness areas. Furthermore, the Forest Service had admitted that the fish stocks were self-sufficient. The construction of the dam on Cherry Reservoir in 1957 had long negated the need for upstream flood control.
Judge Anthony W. Ishii ruled in June 2006 that the dams could not be rebuilt or maintained. But they didn’t have to be disassembled either. They would be left to decompose naturally.
“The area manifested its desert character before the dams were in place and would lose nothing in terms of desert values if the dams were not present,” Ishii wrote in his decision. “What would be lost is some improvement in a particular use of the area (fishing), but that use, while perhaps popular, is not an integral part of the wilderness of that area.”
With that decision, the fate of Fred Leighton’s “check dams” appears to have been resolved. Even without maintenance, many of them can last for another century or more. Meanwhile, fish stocks have remained stable. Each summer, thousands of visitors flock to the Emigrant Wilderness to fish, camp, and enjoy the area’s pristine beauty.