March 10, 2025- Large-scale floodplain restoration at Dos Rios Norte—purchased in 2023 by River Partners and located 20 miles north of Sacramento at the confluence of the Sacramento River, Feather River, and Butte Creek—will enhance California’s climate resilience by replenishing freshwater supplies and providing critical habitat for endangered wildlife.
- Funding from state and federal agencies as well as private-sector support from Apple are accelerating restoration at the scale needed to address California’s water and climate challenges.
- The restoration will greatly benefit all runs of Central Valley Chinook salmon, whose populations have plummeted in the past century.
As California faces increasingly more severe and frequent weather challenges that test the state’s climate resilience—from historic floods to droughts—investments in the type of large-scale, multi-benefit river restoration River Partners has championed since our founding in 1998 are gaining momentum as powerful nature-based solutions. Restoring floodplains replenishes freshwater supplies, improves flood safety, and creates vital habitat for endangered wildlife, all while strengthening the state’s climate resilience.
Building on the success of the historic 2,100-acre Dos Rios Ranch Preserve—the state’s largest public-private floodplain restoration and now California’s newest state park located 80 miles south of Sacramento—we are expanding our model to the largest river confluence in the Central Valley. This new restoration opportunity is located 20 miles north of Sacramento at the confluence of the Sacramento River, Feather River, and Butte Creek. This approximately 1,560-acre site known as Dos Rios Norte presents a rare opportunity to reconnect rivers to their natural floodplains, revitalize ecosystems, and secure water resources for generations to come.
By pairing private-sector investment with state and federal funding, River Partners is proving that strategic partnerships from across sectors can accelerate conservation at the scale needed to meet California’s water and climate challenges. The site, which is currently being farmed in organic rice, lies within the 6,000-acre Sutter Bypass which provides critical flood protection for hundreds of thousands of people and businesses, including the Greater Sacramento area. During storm surges, floodwater is safely diverted off the Sacramento River and away from riverside communities and surrounding farmland through the Sutter and then the Yolo Bypass and safely past Sacramento.
Although Dos Rios Norte floods regularly, it lacks many features of a fully functioning floodplain. By restoring missing native vegetation, habitat complexity and river connectivity, River Partners will transform Dos Rios Norte into a thriving floodplain ecosystem. In fact, our restoration efforts will replenish 15,000 acre-feet of fresh water over the next two decades by converting the site into native habitat. Doing so will reduce water demand significantly allowing existing water uses to be redirected to other environmental purposes.
Transition from Farming to Restoration
In 2023, the California Wildlife Conservation Board (WCB) granted River Partners $22.6 million in funding to acquire the Dos Rios Norte property. Prior to acquisition, the project received funding from the California Department of Fish and Wildlife (CDFW) and U.S. Bureau of Reclamation (USBOR) for restoration studies and planning. In 2025, CDFW awarded River Partners funding to complete planning and permitting for the floodplain restoration project at Dos Rios Norte.
A primary goal of the restoration is to restore riverine habitats for all four once-iconic and now- imperlied Chinook salmon runs within the Sacramento Valley, and a host of riparian habitat dependent birds and other wildlife.
The site is currently farmed in rice through a lease with Lundberg Family Farms. We will continue leasing portions of the property to Lundberg over the next 10 years as restoration plans are developed, permits are obtained, and funding is secured for habitat restoration.
River Partners will start the initial phase of restoration within the next one to two years. Each phase of restoration will involve a 3-year process. At the end of 10 years, the native habitat will be well established, and River Partners will cease irrigation.
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Increased Water Supply, Flood Safety
Restoring Dos Rios Norte is one of the highest priorities for River Partners due to its unique characteristics and conservation opportunities. It holds some of the most valuable water rights in California, including pre- and post-1914 riparian rights, as well as appropriative rights. Riparian water rights simply means the rights are based on the ownership of property adjacent to surface water, while appropriative rights are based on beneficial use of surface water and depend on continued use. When Oroville Dam was built in 1968, the state executed an agreement guaranteeing water to this property specifically.
Today, the ranch uses approximately 7,000 acre-feet of water annually, enough to meet the needs of over 20,000 Californian homes, a portion of which will be dedicated to instream flow for fish and ecosystem benefits following restoration.
The ranch already floods regularly, which is key for natural groundwater recharge and helping to lower floodwater levels and increase flood safety for nearby communities.
Capturing Carbon Naturally
Growing new riverside forests will generate meaningful natural carbon capture. River Partners estimates that restoring Dos Rios Norte will result in the reduction of approximately 137,000 metric tons of carbon-dioxide- equivalent gases over a 20-year period. That’s equivalent to the annual emissions of over 30,000 gas-powered vehicles. The total reductions include 55,000 metric tons of emissions naturally captured by the new riverside forests River Partners will plant and 82,000 metric tons avoided by taking the property out of agricultural production.
A River without a Floodplain
Historically, the Sacramento and Feather rivers carved their way throughout the region, continually flooding and washing away the banks restraining its course and forming new pathways. This resulted in wide and frequently inundated floodplains that were a haven for fish and other wildlife. Natural levees would form on the banks of the river, then break in storms causing unpredictable and uncontrollable inundation across the lower Sacramento River basin.
Current efforts to reconnect low floodplains to river flows in the region target on-river connections like those envisioned at Dos Rios Norte and similar restoration at nearby properties. These efforts also involve re-configuring the system of local overflow weirs constructed over the last 150 years so they can increase the frequency and scale of water inundation to maximize benefits for salmon.
Salmon recovery continues to be a priority for Northern California’s farming community. Since the 1990s, local leaders across the Sacramento Valley have collaborated to envision and deliver noteworthy river restoration through the work of the Floodplain Forward coalition, Floodplains Reimagined program, Central Valley Flood Protection Plan and its associated Conservation Strategy, Sacramento River Forum, and many others.
The ultimate vision of Dos Rios Norte is to restore historic features of the meandering river for ecological, water supply, and community benefits. Our efforts complement noteworthy public and private conservation efforts, including California’s 30X30 initiative, the multi-stakeholder Sacramento River Salmon Recovery Program, and others, to restore tens of thousands of acres of riverside habitat throughout the Sacramento River system over the next several decades.
A Boon for Struggling Wildlife
In addition to being an optimal property for establishing riparian and wetland habitat that supports Sacramento splittail; Central Valley spring-run, winter-run, and fall-run Chinook salmon; and Central Valley steelhead; Dos Rios Norte will boost populations of the imperiled giant garter snake and the valley elderberry longhorn beetle.
Multiple avian species will also benefit from restoration, including the Swainson’s hawk, yellow-billed cuckoo, least Bell’s vireo and other neo-tropical migratory birds, in addition to millions of waterfowl that migrate along the Pacific Flyway each year, and important pollinators such as bees and monarch butterflies.
Dos Rios Norte is adjacent to the Sutter Bypass Wildlife Area, just north of Fremont Weir Wildlife Area, and downriver from the Feather River Wildlife Area (each managed by the California Department of Fish and Wildlife (CDFW)). CDFW database identifies the project site as a category 5 “irreplaceable and essential corridor.” This is due to the wide range of species that rely on the Sutter Bypass and major waterways that define it for migration throughout the Sacramento Valley. Preserving and improving this corridor through conservation and restoration will further enhance the value of this site for many species.
Breaching agricultural berms built on the property over the last century will enhance habitat connectivity on the property’s historic floodplain to increase beneficial salmon habitat and provide high quality rearing habitat during oceanward migration.
Populations of all wild runs of Chinook salmon in the Sacramento River watershed have declined dramatically over the last century due in part to extensive river channelization and disconnection from historic floodplains. Only intensive human management like temperature management, gravel augmentation, and hatchery operations props up an increasingly perilous existence. Many factors influence a young salmon’s survival during its journey to the ocean, where it will spend several years before returning to freshwater rivers to spawn. These include adequate river flows, and access to a diversity of rearing habitats where abundant food and cover, and sufficiently cool waters exist. Landscape scale restoration of floodplain habitat like that planned at Dos Rios Norte will provide a large addition of functional floodplain habitat that salmon from multiple Central Valley rivers can rely on for years.
Long-Term Vision
River Partners is exploring transferring the property to a local Native American Tribe, the Shingle Springs Band of Miwok Indians, descendants of the Miwok and Southern Maidu “Nisenan” Indians.
Members of the Tribe trace their ancestry to the banks of Dos Rios Norte as their last village site prior to removal to the rancheria at Verona, across the river from the property. Since acquisition, River Partners and the Tribe’s Traditional Ecological Knowledge program have opened dialogue about access and stewardship partnership.
Dos Rios Norte represents a model for how restoration can work at scale, proving that nature-based solutions can drive meaningful, on-the-ground change. With strong partnerships and continued investment, this effort will leave a lasting legacy—one where thriving rivers sustain both people and wildlife for generations to come.
