EPIMS Update We are excited to announce a new user interface for EPIMS (PDF) coming September 23, 2024. The current EPIMS website will undergo a system upgrade and will be offline/unavailable September 11, 2024, through September 22, 2024. We appreciate your patience and understanding as we work to improve our system for your benefit. EPIMS - Online Permitting Portal Cannabis Program Permitting Environment Restoration Grant Program Growers' Corner Enforcement Laws and Regulations (opens in new tab) (opens in new tab) (opens in new tab) Report Illegal Cannabis Grows on Public Lands Call 888-334-2258 or Text to 847411 (TIP411) (opens in new tab) California is unique and diverse with the highest level of biodiversity in the entire nation. CDFW has a public trust responsibility to protect and conserve California’s fish and wildlife resources. Cannabis cultivators, like other project proponents, must comply with Fish and Game Code. Working together, we can ensure environmentally-friendly cannabis cultivation. Watch it now: Cannabis LSA Workshops, September 13, 2023 & September 28, 2023 (Video)(opens in new tab) CDFW hosted two online workshops to review how licensed cultivators can stay up to date with their Lake or Streambed Alteration (LSA) agreement and what to do when it is expired or when the project authorized by the agreement is complete. Presentation Slides (PDF)(opens in new tab) Resource Hyperlinks (PDF)(opens in new tab) Online Commercial Cannabis Permitting Workshop (Video)(opens in new tab) July 22, 2020 Presented by CDFW, Department of Cannabis Control (formerly CalCannabis) and State Water Resources Control Board (State Water Board). Spanish edition (Video)(opens in new tab) Hmong edition (Video)(opens in new tab) Learn About the Cannabis Program 2019 CDFW Cannabis Program Summary (PDF)(opens in new tab) 2018 CDFW Cannabis Annual Report (PDF)(opens in new tab) PermittingEnvironmentRestorationEnforcementResources Permitting Learn about permitting for cannabis projects. Learn about the General Agreement for cannabis cultivation projects. Begin your online notification. Learn about the Lake and Streambed Alteration Program. Have questions about our Environmental Permit Information Management System (EPIMS)? Environment Learn about how cannabis cultivation can impact the environment. Visit CDFW's rodenticide page. Learn about what pesticides are legal to use on cannabis. NEW! View the study plan (PDF) and fact sheet (PDF) about a CDFW pilot study investigating the relationship between aquatic habitat quality parameters and stream flow in watersheds with and without current cannabis cultivation. NEW! A Review of the Potential Impacts of Cannabis Cultivation on Fish and Wildlife Resources (PDF) Restoration Learn about cannabis cultivation site restoration. Learn about the Cannabis Restoration Grant Program. Read about restoration projects funded in 2017. Enforcement Learn more about cannabis cultivation law enforcement. Report a polluting or poaching incident or a fish and game code violation. Other Agencies, Laws, Regulations Medicinal and Adult-Use Cannabis Regulation and Safety Act (SB 94) Comprehensive Adult Use of Marijuana Act (Prop 64) (PDF) Comprehensive Medical Cannabis Regulation and Safety Act (SB 837) (PDF) Department of Cannabis Control State Water Board Cannabis Cultivation Program Region 1 (North Coast Regional Water Board) Waiver of Waste Discharge Requirements Region 5 (Central Valley Regional Water Board) Waste Discharge Requirements Bureau Of Medical Cannabis Regulation California Department of Pesticide Regulation California State Association of Counties Best Management Practices Cannabis Farmer's Series 2016 Compliance Handbook North Coast (PDF) Watershed Best Management Practices for Cannabis Growers and other Rural Gardeners (PDF) Legal Pest Management Practices for Cannabis Growers in California (PDF) Pesticide Use on Cannabis (PDF) Pesticides That Can Be Used on Cannabis (PDF) Pesticides That CANNOT Be Used on Cannabis (PDF) Reports and Publications NEW! A Review of the Potential Impacts of Cannabis Cultivation on Fish and Wildlife Resources (PDF) General Information National Drug Intelligence Center (NDIC). 2009. Domestic cannabis cultivation assessment 2009 (PDF). United States Department of Justice, Washington D.C., USA. Babcock, H. M. 2017. Illegal marijuana cultivation on public lands: Our federalism on a very bad trip (PDF). Ecology Law Quarterly 43:473-780. Butsic, V. and J. C. Brenner. 2016. Cannabis (Cannabis sativa or C. indica) agriculture and the environment: a systematic, spatially-explicit survey and potential impacts. Environmental Research Letters 11:044023. Carah, J. K., J. K. Howard, S. E. Thompson, A. G. Short Gianotti, S. D. Bauer, S. M. Carlson, D. N. Dralle, M. W. Gabriel, L. L. Hulette, B. J. Johnson, C. A. Knight, S. J. Kupferberg, S. L. Martin, R. L. Naylor, and M. E. Power. 2015. High time for conservation: Adding the environmental to the debate on marijuana liberalization. BioScience 65:822–829. Rose, J., M. T. J. Brownlee, and K. S. Bricker. 2015. Managers’ perceptions of illegal marijuana cultivation on U.S. federal lands. Society & Natural Resources 29:185-202. Vitiello, M. 2016. Legalizing marijuana and abating environmental harm: An overblown promise? (A Draft). UC Davis Law Review 50. Pacific McGeorge School of Law Research Paper. Habitat Loss and Fragmentation Burns-Edel, T. 2016. Environmental impacts of illicit drug production. Global Societies Journal 4:1–14. Cushman, S. A. 2006. Effects of habitat loss and fragmentation on amphibians: A review and prospectus. Biological Conservation 128:231-240. Mallery, M. 2010. Marijuana National Forest: Encroachment on California public lands for cannabis cultivation. Berkeley Undergraduate Journal 23:1–17. Milestone, J. F., K. Hendricks, A. Foster, J. Richardson, S. Denniston, A. Demetry, M. Ehmann, C. Cuvelier, D. Schifsky, and D. Fireman. 2011. Continued cultivation of illegal marijuana in U.S. western national parks. 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Effects of multiple low-head dams on fish, macroinvertebrates, habitat, and water quality in the Fox River, Illinois. North American Journal of Fisheries Management 25:975–992. Water Diversion Anderson, E. P., M. C. Freeman, and C. M. Pringle. 2006. Ecological consequences of hydropower development in Central America: Impacts of small dams and water diversion on neotropical stream fish assemblages. River Research and Applications 22:397-411. Bunn, S. E., and A. H. Arthington. 2002. Basic principles and ecological consequences of altered flow regimes for aquatic biodiversity (PDF). Environmental Management 30:492-507. Deitch, M. J., G. M. Kondolf, and A. M. Merelender. 2009. Surface water balance to evaluate the hydrological impacts of small instream diversions and application to the Russian River basin, California, USA (PDF). Aquatic Conservation: Marine and Freshwater Ecosystems 19:274-284. Freeman, M. C., and P. A. Marcinek. 2006. Fish assemblage responses to water withdrawls and water supply reservoirs in piedmont streams. Environmental Management 38:435-450. Friedman, J. M., W. R. Osterkamp, M. L. Scott, and G. T. Auble. 1998. Downstream effects of dams on channel geometry and bottomland vegetation: Regional patterns in the Great Plains. Wetlands 18:619-633. Grantham, T. E., and J. H. Viers. 2014. 100 years of California's water rights system: patterns, trends, and uncertainty. Environmental Research Letters 9:084012. Griffith, C. 2016. The grass is greener where you water it: Regulating water use for marijuana cultivation to curb California's severe drought (PDF). Hastings Environmental Law Journal 22:85-105. Harvey, B. C., R. J. Nakamoto, and J. L. White. 2006. Reduced streamflow lowers dry-season growth of rainbow trout in a small stream. Transactions of the American Fisheries Society 135:998-1005. Jonsson, N. 1991. Influence of water flow, water temperature and light on fish migration in rivers. Nordic Journal of Freshwater Research 66:20-35. Kupferberg, S. J., W. J. Palen, A J. Lind, S. Bobziern, A. Catenazzi, J. Drennan, and M. E. Power. 2012. Effects of flow regimes altered by dams on survival, population declines, and range-wide losses of California river-breeding frogs. Conservation Biology 26:513-524. Marine, K. R., and J. J. Cech, Jr. 2004. Effects of high water temperature on growth, smoltification, and predator avoidance in juvenile Sacramento River chinook salmon (PDF). North American Journal of Fisheries Management 24:198-210. Kondolf, G. M., and R. J. Batalla. 2005. Chapter 11: Hydrological effects of dams and water diversions on rivers of Mediterranean-climate regions: examples from California (PDF). Developments in Earth Surface Processes 7:197-211. McKay, S. F., and A. J. King. 2006. Potential ecological effects of water extraction in small, unregulated streams. River Research and Applications 22:1023-1037. Moore, M. K., and V. R. Townsend. 1998. 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Power. 1996. Effects of disturbance on river food webs. Science 273:1558-1561. Pesticides (Insecticides, Herbicides, and Rodenticides) Annett, R. H. R. Habibi, and A. Hontela. 2014. Impact of glyphosate and glyphosate-based herbicides on the freshwater environment. Journal of Applied Toxicology 34:458-479. Augspurger, T., M. R. Smith, C. U. Meteyer, and K. A. Converse. 1996. Mortality of passerines adjacent to a North Carolina corn field treated with granular carbofuran. Journal of Wildlife Diseases 32:113-116. Berny, P. 2007. Pesticides and the intoxication of wild animals. Journal of Veterinary Pharmacology and Therapeutics 30:93-100. Egea-Serrano, A., R. A. Relyea, M. Tejedo, and M. Torralva. 2012. Understanding of the impact of chemicals on amphibians: A meta-analytic review. Ecology and Evolution 2:1382-1397. Elliott, J. E., S. Hindmarch, C. A. Albert, J. Emery, P. Mineau, and F. Maisonneuve. 2013. Exposure pathways of anticoagulant rodenticides to nontarget wildlife (PDF). Environmental Monitoring and Assessment 186:895-906. Elliot, J. E., B. A. Rattner, R. F. Shore, and N. W. Van Den Brink. 2016. Paying the pipers: Mitigating the impact of anticoagulant rodenticides on predators and scavengers. BioScience 66:401-407. Erickson, W., and D. Urban. 2004. Potential risks of nine rodenticides to birds and nontarget mammals: a comparitive approach (PDF). U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, Washington D.C., USA. Fleischli, M. A., J. C. Franson, N. J. Thomas, D. L. Finley, and W. Riley, Jr. 2004. Avian mortality events in the United States caused by anticholinesterase pesticides: A retrospective summary of national wildlife health center records from 1980 to 2000. Archives of Environmental Contamination and Toxicology 46:542-550. Franklin, A. B., P. C. Carlson, A. Rex, J. T. Rockweit, D. Garza, E. Culhane, S. F. Volker, R. J. Dusek, V. I., Shearn-Bochsler, M. W. Gabriel, and K. E. Horak. 2018. Grass is not always greener: Rodenticide exposure of a threatened species near marijuana growing operations. BMC Research Notes 11:1-8. Freemark, K., and C. Boutin. 1995. Impacts of agricultural herbicide use on terrestrial wildlife in temperature landscapes: A review with special reference to North America. Agriculture, Ecosystems and Environments 52:67-91. Gabriel, M. W., L. V. Diller, J. P. Dumbacher, G. W. Wengert, J. M. Higley, R. H. Poppenga, and S. Mendia. 2018. Exposure to rodenticide in Northen Spotted and Barred Owls on remote forest lands in northwestern California: evidence of food web contamination. Avian Conservation and Ecology 13:art2. Gabriel, M. W., L. W. Woods, G. M. Wengert, N. Stephenson, J. M. Higley, C. Thompson, S. M. Matthews, R. A. Sweitzer, K. Purcell, R. H. Barrett, S. M. Keller, P. Gaffney, M. Jones, R. Poppenga, J. E. Foley, R. N. Brown, D. L. Clifford, and B. N. Snacks. 2015. Patterns of natural and human-caused mortality factors of a rare forest carnivore, the fisher (Pekania pennanti) in California. PLoS ONE 10:e0140640. Gabriel, M. W., L. W. Woods, R. Poppenga, R. A. Sweitzer, C. Thompson, S. M. Matthews. J. M. Higley, S. M. Keller, K. Purcell, R. H. Barrett, G. M. Wengert. B. N. Sacks, and D. L. Clifford. 2012. Anticoagulant rodenticides on our public and community lands: Spatial distribution of exposure and poisoning of a rare forest carnivore. PLoS ONE 7:e40163. Hosea, R. 2000. Exposure of non-target wildlife to anticoagulant rodenticides in California (PDF). Pages 236-244 in T. P. Salmon and A. C. Crabb, editors. Proceedings of the 19th Vertebrate Pest Conference. University of California, Davis, CA, USA. Kiesecker, J. M. 2002. Synergism between trematode infection and pesticide exposure: A link to amphibian limb deformities in nature? Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences 99:9900-9904. Kotthoff, M., H. Rüdel, H. Jürling, K. Severin, S. 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In vivo and in vitro effects of the organochlorine pesticides DDT, TCPM, methoxychlor, and lindane on the female reproductive tract of mammals: A review. Reproductive Toxicology 25:316-326. United States Department of Agriculture (USDA). 2000. Conservation buffers to reduce pesticide losses (PDF). Natural Resources Conservation Service, USDA, Washington, D.C., USA. Van den Brink, N. W., J. E. Elliott, R. F. Shore, and B. A. Rattner. 2018. Anticoagulant rodenticides and wildlife: Introduction. Pages 1-9 in N. van den Brink, J. Elliot, R. Shore, and B. Rattner, editors. Anticoagulant Rodenticides and Wildlife: Emerging Topics in Ecotoxicology (Principles, Approaches and Perspectives), Volume 5. Springer International Publishing, San Francisco, CA, USA. Light Pollution Gaston, K. J., J. Bennie, T. W. Davies, and J. Hopkins. 2013. The ecological impacts of nighttime light pollution: a mechanistic appraisal. Biological Reviews 88:912-927. Gern. W. A., D. O. Norris, and D. Duval. 1983. The effects of light and temperature on plasma melatonin in neotenic tiger salamanders (Ambystoma tigrinum). Journal of Herpetology 17:228-234. Longcore, T., and C. Rich. 2004. Ecological light pollution - Review. Frontiers in Ecology and the Environmental 2:191-198. Miller, M. W. 2006. Apparent effects of light pollution on signing behavior of American robins. The Condor 108:130-139. Navara, K. J., and R. J. Nelson. 2007. The dark side of light at night: physiological, epidemiological, and ecological consequences (PDF). Journal of Pineal Research 43:215-224. Rowse, E. G., D. Lewanzik, E. L. Stone, S. Harris, and G. Jones. 2015. Dark matters: The effects of artificial lighting on bats. Pages 187-213 in C. Voigt and T. Kingstone, editors. Bats in the Anthropocene: Conservation of Bats in a Changing World. Springer International Publishing, San Francisco, CA, USA. Tabor, R. A., G. S. Brown, and V. T. Luiting. 2004. The effect of light intensity on sockeye salmon fry migratory behavior and predation by cottids in the Cedar River, Washington. North American Journal of Fisheries Management 24:128-145. Wise, S. 2007. Studying the ecological impacts of light pollution on wildlife: Amphibians as models (PDF). Pages 209-218 in C. Marín and J. Jafari, editors. StarLight: A Common Heritage, Proceedings of the StarLight 2007 Conference, International Initiative in Defense of the Quality of the Night Sky and Right to Observe the Stars. StarLight Initiative, Instituo de Astrofísica de Canarias, La Palma, Canary Islands, Spain. Noise Pollution Barber, J. R., K. R. Crooks, and K. M. Fristrup. 2009. The costs of chronic noise exposure for terrestrial organisms (PDF). Trends in Ecology and Evolution 25:180-189. Francis, C. D., and J. R. Barber. 2013. A framework for understanding noise impacts on wildlife: An urgent conservation priority. Frontiers in Ecology and the Environment 11:305-313. Francis, C. D., C. P. Oretga, and A. Cruz. 2009. Noise pollution changes avian communities and species interactions. Current Biology 19:1415-1419. Hayward, L. S., A. E. Bowles, J. C. Ha, and S. K. Wasser. 2011. Impacts of acute and long-term vehicle exposure on physiology and reproductive success of the northern spotted owl. Ecosphere 2:1-20. Kight, C. R., and J. P. Swaddle. 2011. How and why environmental noise impacts animals: An integrative, mechanistic review. Ecology Letters 14:1052-1061. Ortega, C. P. 2002. Effects of noise pollution on birds: A brief review of our knowledge. Ornithological Monographs 74:6-22. Parris, K. M., M. Veli-lord, and J. M.A. North. 2009. Frogs call at a higher pitch in traffic noise. Ecology and Society 14:25. Patricelli, G., and J. J. L. Blickley. 2006. Avian communication in urban noise: causes and consequences of vocal adjustment. Auk 123:639-649. Schaub, A., J. Ostwald, and B. M. Siemers. 2008. Foraging bats avoid noise. Journal of Experimental Biology 211:3174-3180. Fencing Paige, C. 2012. A landowner's guide to wildlife friendly fences (PDF). Second Edition. Private Land Technical Assistance Program, Montana Fish, Wildlife & Parks, Helena, MT. Paige, C. 2012. A landowner's guide to fences and wildlife: Practical tips to make your fences wildlife friendly (PDF). Wyoming Land Trust, Pinedale, WY. Carbon Footprint Mills, E. 2012. The carbon footprint of indoor Cannabis production (PDF). Energy Policy 46:58-67. Partner Agencies Department of Cannabis Control State Water Resource Control Board Cannabis California Department of Pesticide Regulation Cannabis Contact Us Email the Cannabis Program at AskCannabis@wildlife.ca.gov CalTip