The Feather River Basin Report Card provides a description of conditions relative to our expectations and goals for the Basin. It is a science-based solution to a social and management need. The Report Card measures aspects of the whole integrated system relative to stakeholder goals. It reports on the system using regionally-important and science-based indicators. Because the indicators are assessed using transparent reference points, they provide a measurement of health that can be assessed in future report cards.
The Feather River Watershed is located in California’s northern Sierra Nevada and encompasses a broad variety of terrain, climate, historic use, and flora and fauna. It drains over 6,000 square miles of landscape, from the Sierra Nevada crest westward into the Sacramento River. It is the largest tributary to the Sacramento River below Shasta Lake. Watershed elevation ranges from ~100 to over 10,000 feet, and annual precipitation varies broadly from more than 70 inches on the wet western slopes to less that 12 inches on the arid east side. Vegetation is diverse and ranges from productive agricultural lands, grasslands, and oak savannah in the west to sparse sage/yellow pine plant communities in the east.