Coastal ranch land returned to tribal hands for stewardship

The 466-acre Dillon Beach Ranch property is between Dillon Beach and Bodega Bay.

photo credit: CDFW/J. Wagstaff
The estuary mouth and beach of the Estero de San Antonio just north of Dillon Beach.

A large expanse of easy to see, but hard to access coastline has been given over for stewardship by Sonoma County's Graton Rancheria.

The relatively wild and rugged land between Dillon Beach and Bodega Bay, called the Dillon Beach Ranch, had been owned by the Western Rivers Conservancy for most of the last year.

Josh Kling is conservation director for Western Rivers Conservancy.

"It's 466 acres along a mile and a half of the coastline and a mile and a half of the Estero de San Antonio," Kling said. "It offers these sweeping views from Bodega Bay across Tomales Bay to the northern tip of Point Reyes."

The Estero de San Antonio's layout and long sandbar at the mouth create an important estuary Kling noted, one that is already protected by California’s Department of Fish and Wildlife .

"It is providing really important habitat for a really small sort of innocuous fish called the Northern Tidewater Goby," Kling said. "It thrives in the brackish water where fresh and salt water meet."

Kling said the landscape’s other contours; coastal bluffs, grassland, creek bed, and intertidal zone; makes the ranch ideal for conservation.

It's also home to noteworthy species like the California red-legged frog, and, "it's also one of only four known locations of Myrtle silver spot butterfly," Kling said.

Myrtle’s silver spots live up along the coastal bluffs, Kling noted, "where you've got really strong winds."

"It's a beautiful stout little butterfly that doesn't fly that far off the ground due to those coastal winds," Kling said. "What makes the ranch particularly important is that it has good populations of a wild flower called western dog violet. That is the species that the Myrtle silver spot butterfly's larvae need to develop and eventually grow into adults."

Kling said transfer of the land to the Graton Rancheria is one of a number of successful partnerships between the Western River Conservancy and tribal nations, based on shared goals.

"Our mission is to protect the most outstanding rivers in the West for the benefit of fish, wildlife, and people," Kling said. "We knew that the property was going to be sold, so that is what provoked us to become involved in acquiring the property. And then our next thought was, okay, who would be the ideal long-term steward for this property?"

The Dillon Beach Ranch lies within the territory of the Coast Miwok people.

Federated Indians of Graton Rancheria chairman Greg Sarris celebrated the return of the land to tribal stewardship by rancheria members whose ties stretch back to what he said is "time immemorial."