Groups seek stronger protection for 200,000 acres in Siskiyou County with 'purest water'

From the air, the Medicine Lake Highlands in Siskiyou County appears as a vast expanse of mountains covered in forests of pine and fir.

But what has groups such as Trout Unlimited, the Pit River Nation and Backcountry Hunters & Anglers of California eager to get federal protection for the area can't be seen on the surface of the mountains or in the fields of volcanic rock.

Underground lies an aquifer so large that it could hold the same amount of water as California's largest 200 reservoirs combined, according to Trout Unlimited. That subsurface reservoir feeds a system of streams that are part of a valuable trout stream that extends south into Shasta County, the group says.

"We should pull out all the stops to protect it. It's too valuable as a water supply, not just for downstream human uses. It's a key component to the federal Central Valley Water Project, and it's the purest water in that whole complex, and it's the sole source of water for one of the most famous trout streams in California and maybe even the Western U.S.," said Sam Davidson, a spokesman for Trout Unlimited, referring to the Fall River.

"So it's a pretty rare bird, that area," he said.

Members of the Pit River Tribe refer to the area as Sattitla, and it has been home to them for thousands of years. Brandy McDaniels, Sattitla lead for the Pit River Nation, said the tribe is interested in garnering national monument designation as a way to preserve the area from development.

"This area is very valuable, not only to our tribe, but to the entire region, and the state of California and the world, as a natural buffer to climate change," McDaniels said.

"The work that I'm doing as the lead for the national monument, that genesis of that, is from our ancestors and from our elders, is the instructions that we've been given to protect and preserve this place," she said.

The Medicine Lake Highlands is already on the National Register of Historic Places as a Traditional Cultural District, according to Trout Unlimited.

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The area proposed as a national monument is 200,000 acres of volcanic mountains east of Mt. Shasta. The U.S. Forest Service, which manages land in the area, says the area has a long volcanic history and much of it consists of the remnants of a huge volcano that has subsided over thousands of years.

The area also includes Medicine Lake at the summit of the volcano. In addition, there are large fields of pumice and obsidian glass formed from volcanic eruptions.

The U.S. Geological Survey said there was an "explosive eruption" near Glass Mountain 950 years ago in the Medicine Lake Highlands.

The Medicine Lake area is just south of Lava Beds National Monument, also known for its volcanic legacy and numerous lava tubes.

Geothermal energy — potential or threat?

Because of the volcanic activity and large underground reservoir, there also is geothermal energy potential that the Pit River Tribe has been fighting for more than 25 years, McDaniels said.

Davidson said setting aside the area as a national monument could preserve the groundwater, but prohibit other activities such as geothermal development. Hunting, fishing and other recreational activities could continue if the area became a national monument.

U.S. President Joe Biden has the authority to create national monuments, without congressional approval, Trout Unlimited said.

Five nonprofit agencies sent a letter at the end of May to the Biden administration, asking the president to consider setting the area aside as a national monument.

Trout Unlimited received a reply earlier this month to its letter. Davidson said the letter from the deputy director of the U.S. Forest Service was friendly, but also "fairly noncommittal."

The Medicine Lake Highlands is within land managed by the Klamath, Modoc and Shasta-Trinity national forests.

The Record Searchlight asked a forest service spokesman at the California regional office if the agency supported creating a national monument at Medicine Lake Highlands, but the newspaper did not receive a reply.

The 113,000-acre Cascade-Siskiyou National Monument, which straddles the border of California and Oregon, was on a list of 26 national monuments that came under review by then-President Donald Trump in 2017.

Some feared the Trump administration was interested in eliminating or reducing the size of the Cascade-Siskiyou monument, but no changes were made to the size of the area.

U.S. Rep. Doug LaMalfa, R-Richvale, said he didn't think putting the area in national monument status was necessary because it is already protected from development. He said receiving permits is already difficult on forest service lands, and forbidding further development would make it more difficult to fight wildfires in the area because there are too few roads.

"They just want to lock everything up so nobody can access it hardly at all. These aren't the friends of rural California here. They say, 'Oh, we're fishermen. We're sportsmen.' Like no, they're environmentalists parading as sportsmen," LaMalfa said.

Reporter Damon Arthur welcomes story tips at 530-338-8834, by email at damon.arthur@redding.com and on X, formerly known as Twitter, at @damonarthur_RS. Help local journalism thrive by subscribing today!