Fish Love Floods: Benefits of Floodplains in San Francisco Estuary

Lots of rain can make rivers rise, causing them to spill into low-lying areas called floodplains. Floodplains protect cities from flooding and provide food-rich, safe habitats for freshwater creatures. The largest floodplain of the San Francisco Estuary is the Yolo Bypass. The Yolo Bypass is connected to the Sacramento River and protects Sacramento and surrounding areas from flooding. A twenty-plus year scientific monitoring program in the Yolo Bypass has documented many benefits that this floodplain provides to the Estuary. For example, the Yolo Bypass is a nursery area for baby fish such as young Chinook salmon and Sacramento splittail, and it is an important food bank that transports fish food to the rest of the Estuary. This article discusses some of the benefits that floodplains provide for fish species, and it highlights the importance of long-term monitoring to help scientists and managers make decisions for the benefit of fishes and ecosystems.