Leslee Hamilton, executive director of the Guadalupe River Park Conservancy, is heartbroken as there was a time when Guadalupe River used to flow downtown San Jose, but now it does not. Its fish and wildlife is either missing or dead.

Hamilton said that they were in fact witnessing a rise in the number of birds and wildlife in the area and this condition is quite sad. Gordon Becker, a fisheries scientist with the Center for Ecosystem Management and Restoration, said that Guadalupe River is not alone to have met this fate. With time, every stream is going dry.

Spanish explorer Juan Bautista de Anza named the Guadalupe River for the Virgin of Guadalupe. He had camped alongside it when he was on his way to Monterey to San Francisco. Matt Clifford, an attorney with Trout Unlimited, said that it is important not to make conditions worse in the case of draught, as the deeper one falls into this condition, the worse it gets.

The river has witnessed its side of ups and downs. It went through years of restoration and got back trout, salmon, beavers and wildlife species. But again, the drought took a toll on the river and now the large sections of the river have turned into miles of cracked, arid gray riverbed.

Terry Austen with the Guadalupe River Park Conservancy said that the condition throws negative impact on wildlife. Austen is quite confident that wildlife will return if the water returns.