Temescal Creek (Riverside County)

Temescal Creek (shown on federal maps as Temescal Wash[1]) is an approximately 29-mile-long (47 km)[2] watercourse in Riverside County, in the U.S. state of California. Flowing primarily in a northwestern direction, it connects Lake Elsinore with the Santa Ana River. It drains the eastern slopes of the Santa Ana Mountains on its left and on its right the western slopes of the Temescal Mountains along its length. With a drainage basin of about 1,000 square miles (2,600 km2), it is the largest tributary of the Santa Ana River, hydrologically connecting the 720-square-mile (1,900 km2) San Jacinto River and Lake Elsinore watersheds to the rest of the Santa Ana watershed. However, flowing through an arid rain shadow zone of the Santa Ana Mountains, and with diversion of ground water for human use, the creek today is ephemeral for most of its length, except for runoff from housing developments and agricultural return flows.

Temescal Creek
Map of the Santa Ana River watershed. Temescal Creek connects the San Jacinto River to the Santa Ana River at Lake Elsinore.
Location
CountryUnited States
Physical characteristics
Source 
 • locationLake Elsinore
Mouth 
 • location
Santa Ana River
Length20 miles (32 km)
Basin size850 square miles (2,200 km2)
Discharge 
 • average30 cubic feet per second (0.85 m3/s)
Basin features
ProgressionSoutheast-northwest
Tributaries 
 • leftRice Canyon Creek, Horsetheif Canyon Creek, Indian Canyon Creek, Mayhew Canyon Creek, Coldwater Canyon Creek, Brown Canyon Creek, Bedford Canyon Wash, Joseph Canyon Creek, Main Street Canyon Wash, Oak Avenue Drain
 • rightWasson Canyon Creek, Arroyo Del Toro, Stovepipe Canyon Wash, Gavilan Wash, Alberhill Canyon Creek, Ceramic Canyon Creek, Dawson Canyon Creek, Olsen Canyon Creek, Cajalco Creek, Arlington Valley Channel

History

Prior to 1886, Temescal Valley and Temescal Creek that flowed through it had much more water than today. In May, 1886 the South Riverside Land and Water Company was incorporated, and it purchased the lands of Rancho La Sierra of Bernardo Yorba, and the Rancho Temescal grant where the colony of South Riverside was laid out. They also secured the water rights to Temescal Creek, its tributaries and Lee Lake. Dams and pipelines were built to carry the water to the colony. In 1889 the Temescal Water Company was incorporated, to supply water for the new colony. This company purchased all the water-bearing lands in the valley and began drilling artesian wells.[3]

The first wells flowed, at a depth of 300 feet. However, pumping plants soon had to be installed as the water table fell. In time all the water of both Temescal and Coldwater Creeks was turned into pipe lines. Cienagas and springs were drained, and, gradually, the central portion of the Temescal Valley became dry and desolate. Farms and orchards in Temescal the central part of the Temescal Valley were abandoned by 1918.[3]

In the 1890s Lake Elsinore water was purchased by the Temescal Water Company for the irrigation of land in Corona, California. Its outlet channel was deepened, permitting gravity flow down the natural channel of Temescal Canyon to Corona for a year or more after the water level sank below the natural elevation of its outlet. As the lake surface continued to recede, a pumping plant was installed, and pumping was continued a few seasons, but the concentration of salts in the lake, due to the evaporation and lack of rainfall, soon made the water unfit for irrigation, and the project was abandoned by the company.[4] Another consequence of this drainage was that the hot springs along the course of the upper creek near Lake Elsinore and in the Warm Springs Valley, ceased to flow and wells had to be dug to obtain those waters.

The water shortage was relieved by the construction of the Colorado River Aqueduct and the building of its terminal reservoir Lake Mathews in 1939. The reservoir is in the upper part of Cajalco Canyon and the lower reach of the Cajalco Valley, on the course of Cajalco Creek, tributary to Temescal Wash.

Watershed

Today Temescal Creek begins as the Elsinore Spillway Channel, an overflow channel that now confines its upper reaches through the middle of downtown Lake Elsinore, then turns and passes northwestward into the Warm Springs Valley, past its confluence with Wasson Canyon Wash, on the right, until it is past the water treatment plant. There it is permitted to spread out into a natural creek, where it has its confluence with Arroyo Del Toro and Stovepipe Canyon Wash on its right, then passes through Walker Canyon gathering in the Gavilan Wash on its right midway on its length, then to where Alberhill Canyon Creek enters on the right Temescal Creek emerges from Walker Canyon. There it has its confluence with the wash of Rice Canyon Creek on its left near Alberhill and Ceramic Factory Canyon Creek on its right across the creek from the ceramic factory. Shortly afterward it crosses underneath the Escondido (I-15) Freeway, is joined by Horsetheif Canyon Creek on its left and flows into Lee Lake, formed by an earthen dam across the creek at the northwest end of the valley before its confluence on its left with Indian Canyon Creek.

The creek is then blocked to the northwest by a ridge of the Santa Ana Mountains running northeast to a steep 1577 foot summit overlooking the deep canyon between it and Estelle Mountain. This ridge divides the Temescal Valley below from the upper valley of Temescal creek. Descending through this unnamed canyon, the creek makes a half circle around the ridge to the north of Lee Lake to enter the Temescal Valley. The creek levels out after leaving the Estelle Mountain canyon, passing through a natural riverbed, the creek receives Mayhew Canyon Wash from the left, Dawson Canyon Wash from the right, Coldwater Canyon Creek and the waters of Brown Canyon Wash and its tributary of McBribe Canyon Creek from the left, Olsen Canyon Wash and Cajalco Creek from the right and Bedford Canyon Wash and Joseph Canyon from the left before entering Temescal Canyon.

As it emerges from Temescal Canyon, north of El Cerrito the creek enters a second reservoir and is forced into a concrete channel. It then flows through the northern part of the city of Corona taking in the Main Street Canyon Wash and Oak Avenue Drain on its left and Arlington Valley Channel on its right before entering into the Prado Flood Control Basin, formed by the Prado Dam across the Santa Ana River. The basin consists of a series of wetlands where Temescal Creek merges with the Santa Ana. In floods, however, the area is a lake, and Temescal Creek's confluence with the larger river is submerged.

Tributaries of Temescal Creek

See also

References
  1. U.S. Geological Survey Geographic Names Information System: Temescal Wash
  2. U.S. Geological Survey. National Hydrography Dataset high-resolution flowline data. The National Map, accessed March 16, 2011
  3. Rose L. Ellerbee,History of Temescal Valley, Publications of the Historical Society of Southern California, Volume 11, 1918 pp.18-19
  4. Water-supply paper, Volumes 425–429 By Geological Survey (U.S.), History of Elsinore Lake, p. 255
  5. U.S. Geological Survey Geographic Names Information System: Arlington Valley Channel
  6. USGS Map: Corona South, CA; Oak Avenue Drain, Mouth: 33°53′39″N 117°34′42″W, Elevation: 701 feet
  7. U.S. Geological Survey Geographic Names Information System: Mabey Canyon
  8. U.S. Geological Survey Geographic Names Information System: Oak Street Creek Reservoir
  9. U.S. Geological Survey Geographic Names Information System: Hagador Canyon
  10. U.S. Geological Survey Geographic Names Information System: Tin Mine Canyon
  11. U.S. Geological Survey Geographic Names Information System: Main Street Wash
  12. U.S. Geological Survey Geographic Names Information System: Main Street Canyon
  13. U.S. Geological Survey Geographic Names Information System: Eagle Canyon
  14. U.S. Geological Survey Geographic Names Information System: Joseph Canyon
  15. U.S. Geological Survey Geographic Names Information System: Bedford Canyon
  16. U.S. Geological Survey Geographic Names Information System: Cajalco Canyon
  17. U.S. Geological Survey Geographic Names Information System: Harford Spring, spring: 33°48′47″N 117°21′32″W, elevation: 1837 feet; USGS Map: Steele Peak, CA, mouth: 33°50′03″N 117°21′42″W, elevation: 1475 feet; head: 33°47′27″N 117°19′35″W, elevation: 2215 feet
  18. U.S. Geological Survey Geographic Names Information System: Mead Valley mouth: 33°50′13″N 117°18′55″W elevation: 1601 feet, head: 33°52′19″N 117°17′52″W, elevation: 1695 feet
  19. U.S. Geological Survey Geographic Names Information System: Olsen Canyon
  20. U.S. Geological Survey Geographic Names Information System: Brown Canyon
  21. U.S. Geological Survey Geographic Names Information System: McBribe Canyon
  22. U.S. Geological Survey Geographic Names Information System: Coldwater Canyon
  23. U.S. Geological Survey Geographic Names Information System: Dawson Canyon
  24. U.S. Geological Survey Geographic Names Information System: Mayhew Canyon
  25. U.S. Geological Survey Geographic Names Information System: Indian Canyon
  26. U.S. Geological Survey Geographic Names Information System: Lee Lake
  27. U.S. Geological Survey Geographic Names Information System: Lee Lake 818-002 Dam
  28. U.S. Geological Survey Geographic Names Information System: Cow Canyon
  29. U.S. Geological Survey Geographic Names Information System: Horsethief Canyon
  30. USGS Map: Alberhill, CA, Ceramic Factory Canyon, Mouth: 33°43′48″N 117°24′08″W, Elevation: 1200 feet; head: 33°46′10″N 117°22′39″W, Elevation: 2500 feet
  31. U.S. Geological Survey Geographic Names Information System: Bishop Canyon
  32. USGS Map: Alberhill, CA, Alberhill Canyon, Elevation: 1214 feet, mouth, 33°43′45″N 117°23′39″W
  33. U.S. Geological Survey Geographic Names Information System: Walker Canyon
  34. USGS Map: Alberhill, CA, Gavilan Wash (mouth), Elevation: approx. 1230 feet, 33°43′31″N 117°22′27″W
  35. INTERSTATE 15 SB over GAVILAN WASH from uglybridges.com accessed June 2, 2015
  36. USGS Map: Lake Elsinore, CA, Stovepipe Canyon, head 33°44′30″N 117°20′38″W, mouth 33°42′29″N 117°20′35″W
  37. U.S. Geological Survey Geographic Names Information System: Arroyo Del Toro
  38. USGS Map: Lake Elsinore, CA, Wasson Canyon 33°40′51″N 117°19′54″W
  39. U.S. Geological Survey Geographic Names Information System: Temescal Wash
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