Bull Creek is the largest Eel River tributary drainage basin preserved within Humboldt Redwoods State Park.

Species important to the centuries-old coastal redwood trees include aquatic plants and animals within adjacent streams.

The entire Bull Creek drainage basin is protected within park boundaries to avoid upstream water quality changes detrimental to aquatic residents of the floodplain where the largest trees grow.

Large-diameter, rot-resistant trunks of fallen redwood trees may resist erosion more effectively than the friable upper Cretaceous marine sedimentary and metasedimentary bedrock of the drainage basin.

Most of the remainder of the Bull Creek watershed was subsequently purchased by Save-the-Redwoods League to encourage upslope forest management practices more similar to natural processes.