Blair Brown and Ernie Cedillo
Back to top or back to home page or back to Whats New
By Brian Peck. U.S. Fish & Wildlife Service
Through the Chehalis Fisheries Restoration Program (CFRP), the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service funds salmon restoration projects throughout the Chehalis River Basin.
Each year, a request for project proposals (RFP) is sent out to potential project sponsors. Typical projects may include: riparian tree planting, riparian fencing, culvert replacement, large wood placement in streams, habitat and fish passage barrier assessments, and outreach and education efforts. If you are interested in receiving an RFP this year, or obtaining more information about the CFRP, please contact me at the number below.
Seven projects are being/will be funded with fiscal year 2001 funds, for a total of $194,002 dollars. There are two outreach/education, two assessment, and three on-the-ground projects as described here:
Chehalis Basin Education Consortium
Proposed by Educational Service District 113, this proposal supports a partnership that fosters environmental education and stewardship throughout the Basin by linking Washington's learning standards to environmental issues that are part of the watershed. Thirty-five 4th 12th grade teachers and 1,000 students from 14 school districts will be involved in this project that focuses on water quality monitoring and pollution prevention.
Drops of Water Newsletter
A monthly newspaper insert compiled by the Chehalis River Council and distributed throughout the Chehalis River Basin. Articles are relevant to current environmental issues (TMDL, water quality/quantity planning) within the Basin.
Newaukum Watershed Culvert Assessment
The Lewis County Conservation District will conduct a comprehensive survey of fish barriers within the Newaukum River watershed. Methods, according to Washington Department of Fish and Wildlife (WDFW) standards, include assessing fish passage at the potential barrier and habitat condition upstream and downstream of the structure. Barriers will then be ranked, which will aid in future prioritization of on the ground restoration efforts.
Spatially Enabled Assessment of Salmonid Habitat
Proposed jointly by WDFW and the Chehalis Basin Fisheries Task Force, this project will compile existing habitat and fisheries data, put it into a GIS based framework, and identify and prioritize restoration activities by stream reach throughout the Chehalis Basin. WDFW will update the database as new data is collected.
Cozy Valley Creek Enhancement
Proposed by the Heernett Environmental Foundation, this project will restore habitat complexity to a straightened segment of Cozy Valley Creek, a tributary to Scatter Creek. Project elements include stream sinuosity, riparian planting, and large wood and gravel placement. Coho salmon will benefit from improved water temperature, spawning substrate, and juvenile rearing and adult holding habitat.
Hampton 540 and 800 Culvert Replacements
These projects, proposed by the Lewis County Conservation District, are located on two tributaries of the South Fork Chehalis River. These culverts have been identified as fish barriers and will be replaced with correctly sized culverts, primarily benefitting coho salmon, cutthroat and steelhead trout.
Brian Peck is the coordinator of the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service's Chehalis Fisheries Restoration Program, 360-753-8084 or brian_peck@fws.gov
Back to top or back to home page or back to Whats New
By Anna Blankenship and Jackie Watts
On January 16, 2002 Mrs. Boyer's 5th grade class at Elma Elementary built a model of the Chehalis River. We were learning about the Chehalis River because we wanted to know how a real water cycle works and what it looks like.
The River was built on two large tables that are shaped like an L. The River begins in a rubber tub marsh and ends in a clean aquarium wetland. A pump circulates the water, which came through from the sediment-filled Satsop River, through a clear plastic pipe and back to the marsh where it starts its cycle all over.
|
Blair Brown and Ernie Cedillo |
First the men, our mighty strong dads, cut and carefully built two wooden frames to fit the two L tables. Then they cut out the dimensions for the white gutters. Next the students sanded and painted the wooden frame. The fathers installed the gutters, the plastic tub marsh and the aquarium wetland. Finally, the students put river gravel and water in the system. We turned it on and discovered we had a couple of waterfalls. We are going to put fish, water plants, frogs, houses, farms, mountains, trees, animals, and Elma Ponds in our Chehalis River model.
The people who helped build our river were Andy, Joyce, and Jackie Watts, Ben and Anna Blankenship, Ruby and Robert Spoonhoward, Zach and Steve Edwards, Ernie Cedillo, Steve, Becky, and Blair Brown, and Mr. and Mrs. Boyer.
Back to top or back to home page or back to Whats New
by Kevin Ranker
For several years, Surfrider Foundation has been following closely the dramatic erosion events on Washington's open ocean coast and adjacent bay shorelines. The Department of Ecology's Southwest Washington Coastal Erosion Study identified expected future erosion along the Washington coastline. Situations like the breach of the South Grays Harbor Jetty in Westport, the erosion of the beach near the North Grays Harbor Jetty in Ocean Shores and the massive erosion at the mouth of Willapa Bay have brought many concerns to property owners, coastal municipalities and thousands of Washington State citizens who enjoy and depend upon Washington's natural sandy beaches.
The Surfrider Foundation is a 501 (c) (3) non-profit environmental organization dedicated to the protection and enhancement of the world's oceans, waves, beaches and coastal habitats through conservation, activism, research and education. The Surfrider Foundation is the waterman's organization. We are surfers, fishermen, divers, and beachgoers -- people who spend a significant amount of time on the coast and in the ocean. Surfrider Foundation recognizes that protecting coastal and marine areas benefits not only diverse fish and wildlife populations, but also the people who enjoy and depend upon them.
Beaches are often perceived as separate habitats, but in reality are small parts of much larger coastal ecosystems. These systems include watersheds, estuaries and wetlands, and nearshore marine environments. They are dynamic in nature, change on multiple temporal and spatial scales, and are therefore difficult to predict with certainty. The Surfrider Foundation advocates conservation actions to promote long-term beach preservation for the benefit of the public.
Washington's beaches are unique coastal environments with enormous ecological, recreational and economic value. Our beaches are a public resource and should be held in the public trust. As human activities and development in coastal areas increase, the need for preservation of beaches becomes increasingly apparent.
In 1998, the Surfrider Foundation took legal action against the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers (Corps) when the agency introduced a plan to place a rock wall along the entire beach of Half Moon Bay in Westport, Washington. Surfrider Foundation recognized that this misguided plan to armor Half Moon Bay would have destroyed the entire beach in the Bay, eliminating beach walking and surfing -- which in recent years has become a source of critical income to the tourist economy of Westport.
The suit had been brought before the Pollution Control Hearings Board by the Surfrider Foundation to challenge Ecology's failure to extract a long-term commitment to beach nourishment from the Corps. Regular beach nourishment is critical to assure that erosion does not degrade the beach and expose the rock revetment, thereby destroying surfing and other recreational uses in Half Moon Bay as well as the revetment itself, requiring expensive and ineffective re-armoring of the shoreline at a future time.
In the summer of 1999, a settlement was reached between the Surfrider Foundation and the Corps relating to the revetment extension in Half Moon Bay. Perhaps the biggest victory for Surfrider Foundation, beach-goers and the citizens of Washington State is that the Corps abandoned its plan to place a rock wall along the entire beach of Half Moon Bay.
Additionally, the settlement required the Corps to strengthen its commitment to beach nourishment in Half Moon Bay, making it more likely that surfers and other beachcombers could continue to enjoy the Bay into the future. The settlement made long-term beach nourishment a component of the Corps' commitment to preserve natural sandy beaches.
However, the Corps has not met its obligation to maintain the beach. Recent events in Half Moon Bay have significantly eroded the beach and have dramatically impacted recreational and environmental resources in the area. Additionally, the wave refraction mound built at the end of the South Jetty at Half Moon Bay designed by the Corps Waterway Experiment Station and Pacific International Engineering seems to be dramatically increasing the erosion immediately adjacent to its construction, making the likelihood of a breach in the South Jetty -- as we saw in 1996 -- imminent. The wave refraction mound has failed to meet its intended purposes to "refract" wave energy away from the beach.
This also raises serious concerns and further argues the need for additional environmental review of the proposal to develop "The Links at Half Moon Bay"-- 18-hole golf course, 400-room resort hotel, convention center and 400 condominiums directly on the coastal area in question. These are the sorts of coastal decisions that can place people and funds in harms way.
Any hard structure in the "impact zone" will cause the beach to erode faster. This is basic coastal geology. It is also basic knowledge to surfers because we know how and where waves break, and for the most part, what causes them. The wave refraction mound in Westport is negatively impacting the beach and surrounding resources because it is a hard structure on a sandy beach and therefore increases the erosion rate in front of and adjacent to its placement. It causes the wave energy to impinge directly on the beach, eroding and steepening the beach.
Those of us who spend a significant amount of time on the beach and in the ocean at Westport are familiar with these naturally occurring coastal processes. In the summer, smaller waves move sand on-shore to build up a wide beach. In the winter, big winter storms wash away beach sand; narrowing and the beach, sometimes forming large offshore sand bars that make waves break (with good outside swell) further from the coastline. Weeks, or sometimes months, later the seasonal waves and currents move the sand bars towards the shore, bringing some of the sand back to the beach (allowing many beachcombers, kite enthusiasts, families and dogs gather to frolic on the open ocean beach). However, the difference in Half Moon Bay is that the natural drift of sand has been blocked by the hard structure so that the natural accretion does not take place.
Historically, the jetties at the mouth of Grays Harbor have impounded sand that was supplied from shallow tidal inlet shoals around the inlet, particularly on the north side of Grays Harbor at Ocean Shores. The jetties removed the influence of ebb-tidal currents on the shoals and, as a result, sand from the shoals was more easily transported onshore by waves. The natural balance between the offshore-directed tidal currents and onshore-directed wave flows that formed the shoals around the inlet was significantly altered, resulting in redistribution of the sand. This is an ongoing process still occurring today, nearly a century after the jetties were constructed.
Today, the inlet between the jetties continues to scour. If the proposed jetty extension/spur to protect the Ocean Shores condominiums is constructed it will reduce the sand supply to the inlet, and further increase erosion within the entrance and in Half Moon Bay.
This process will continue until no beach exists, only hard structures. We have seen this phenomenon on the East Coast, the Gulf Coast and the California Coast for over 100+ years and more recently here in Washington State throughout the Puget Sound and in Ocean Shores and Willipa Bay (where a rock jetty at its mouth seems to have increased beach erosion on both sides of its placement, including the increased erosion of the sand islands that protect the Shoalwater Bay Tribal land and its shellfish resources). Yet, we continue to ignore those lessons and implement the same mistakes that have destroyed ocean beaches and coastal resources elsewhere.
Surfrider Foundation is concerned that the recent policy decisions regarding the management of Washington's open ocean beaches -- including those impacting Half Moon Bay -- have put the future of our beautiful coastline at risk. The Surfrider Foundation is working for the continued preservation of Half Moon Bay and the rest of our Washington Coast.
It is time that Governor Locke, the Department of Ecology and the Army Corps of Engineers took a proactive role, working for the preservation of Westport's beaches and the rest of Washington's ocean coast. For too long our elected officials and state agencies have been able ignore the open ocean coast. Washington's open ocean coast is an ecological treasure of statewide significance. It is a resource whose condition reflects the quality of life in the Pacific Northwest. The region's future vitality is intertwined with the health of its environment and economy. One year ago this week [11-30-00], in a press release from the Department of Ecology, Governor Locke was quoted as saying, "Many of our past shoreline management practices are harming private property, threatening the safety of our citizens, and destroying the quality of our shorelines." Isn't it time we do something about it?
We believe Washington's current coastal management policies are threatening the preservation of our open ocean beaches. We cannot tolerate the loss of our pristine coastline. Preserving Washington's natural sandy beaches is about protecting our coast and nearshore waters - places where we, as watermen -- surfers, divers, fishermen, and beachgoers -- go to enjoy the marine environment. We need to think of the next generation of beach users and our delicate coastal ecosystem when looking at Washington States coastal management.
If you are concerned about the conservation of our natural sandy beaches, take a moment and write to the Governor and tell him that the natural sandy beaches of Westport -- and the rest of the state -- need to be protected and preserved.
This article appeared in the Jan.-Feb. 2002 Issue, Volume 18, Number 1 of Making Waves, a publication of the Surfrider Foundation, and is reprinted with permission from the author.
Back to top or back to home page or back to Whats New
In honor of the 30th anniversary of the Clean Water Act, 2002 has been declared the Year of Clean Water. Volunteer monitors, agency staff, and members of the public are invited to join the celebration by participating in National Water Monitoring Day, scheduled to commemorate the very day-October 18, 1972-on which the Act was signed into law.
Updates on National Water Monitoring Day, including information on preregistration and ordering the special monitoring kit, will be posted at www.yearofcleanwater.org. Participants must register before September 30.
Back to top or back to home page or back to Whats New
By Janet Pearce, Department of Natural Resources, Natural Areas Program and Nancy Ness, Grays Harbor County Noxious Weed Control Board
Nearly 90% of the original wetlands in the Puget Sound have been drained, filled or otherwise permanently altered. Noxious weeds have a negative impact on wetlands. Purple loosestrife can be very attractive with its purple flowers. Parrotfeather can be an attractive green that covers and softens the look of waterways. These invasive plants can be charming, but the fact remains that these weeds alter wetland ecosystems.
Recently the Department of Natural Resources and the Grays Harbor County Noxious Weed Control Board received a $20,000 grant from the Department of Ecology to survey and control purple loosestrife and parrot feather. Staff from these organizations will work as a team to detect and mark these noxious weeds, create maps of weed locations and conduct control work. This grant includes an educational component to provide information to local communities about these noxious weeds. The Washington State Department of Fish and Wildlife is also working on a Chehalis River grant project which focuses on biological controls and related work on purple loosestrife.
 Purple Loosestrife |
Purple loosestrife and parrotfeather are aquatic weeds that are major threats to Washington's remaining wetlands. These weeds are infesting new areas of the Chehalis River system. The negative impact of these noxious weeds is astonishing. They fill in waterways and alter wetland habitats in ways that limit use by native fish and wildlife.
Purple loosestrife has no local natural enemies and spreads quickly to block out native plant life in a wetland. It crowds out native wetland plants and eliminates nutritional food sources. It is a quiet death for wetlands. This brilliant, purple flower chokes out waterways, slows the natural flows and promotes deposit of silt, which leads to degradation of wetlands.
Parrotfeather also can seriously change the physical and chemical characteristics of lakes and streams. It shades out algae in the water column that serve as the basis for the aquatic food web. It prefers slow moving water and forms floating mats on lakes and sloughs. In addition, parrotfeather is becoming an increasing problem in irrigation and drainage canals. The stems of parrotfeather can survive on wet banks of rivers and lake shores, and the plant is well adapted to moderate water level fluctuations.
Parrotfeather |
The Chehalis River Surge Plain Natural Area Preserve is threatened by the encroachment of noxious weeds that endanger the natural system of the wetland. Noxious weeds also threaten critical wildlife habitat and farmlands in the river's floodplain. The Chehalis River is the ecological connection to all these low-lying lands, but it also transports weed seeds to infest new areas. It is important for people who live near or use the river to learn to recognize these plants.
For more information, contact Grays Harbor County Noxious Weed Control Board, Nancy Ness @ 360-482-2265.
Back to top or back to home page or back to Whats New
April 26 - 28, 2002, Hoquiam, Washington
For information call 360.289.5047 or email dlmoor2@coastaccess.com
Check out the Festival web page: www.ghas.org
Back to top or back to home page or back to Whats New
By Janet Strong, Chehalis River Basin Land Trust
This article is part of a series featuring wildlife native to the Chehalis Basin. Unfortunately, although there are oak woodlands in the Basin, especially in the Black River corridor and Scatter Creek subbasin, the western gray squirrel is currently missing from this habitat. Let us know if you have seen one!
With a bushy tail as long as her body, the squirrel flows across the ground in a small gray wave. Her prints resemble tiny pairs of exclamation points marching through the snow. She stops to scratch for caches of nuts and seeds hidden since the fall. Alerted by scent rather than memory, she can locate buried food supplies under a foot of snow.
Scurius griseus, the western gray squirrel, is the Northwest's largest native squirrel. Its body sports muted colors of silver-gray head and back and creamy white underparts. Reddish-brown accents cover the back of the ears. The bushy gray tail is edged in white and dark hairs give it a salt-and-pepper appearance.
Lifestyle
Much more wary and secretive than its sociable cousin, the eastern gray squirrel, our native one avoids disturbance from human activities. It prefers arboreal travel, spending much of its time in the canopy. It builds large leaf and stick nests in the crooks of branches of oak or conifer trees and occupies them year-round. However, in the worst winter weather, it will seek out a snug cavity in a mature oak.
Besides providing winter shelter, oaks are critical for this animal's winter survival for another reason. The western gray squirrels does not hibernate, making it dependent upon acorns stashed in small buried caches. In fact, it is intimately connected to large, mast-producing oaks growing in stands with conifers, within 600 feet of water.
The female produces 3 to 5 young between March and June. In May the young begin to emerge from the nest. In mild weather, squirrels enjoy a varied diet, including mushrooms, buds, bark, fir and pine cones, berries, leaves, stems and insects. Most foraging occurs on the ground. But squirrels also spend considerable time in their nests. A telemetry study showed that a single animal will switch nests within the course of a day and even trade nests with its neighbor.
Longevity in the wild is approximately 8 to 10 years, similar to that of the eastern gray and fox squirrels. This is amazing considering the list of potential predators in Washington red-tailed hawk, golden eagle, great-horned owl, goshawk, bobcat, coyote, cougar and domestic dogs and cats.
Relatives
Our native gray squirrel is closely related to (in the same genus as) two eastern species, the eastern gray squirrel and the fox squirrel. In the Southwest are several more close relatives, the Arizona squirrel, the Apache squirrel in northern Mexico and the beautiful tassel-eared squirrels -- Albert and Kaibob of the Grand Canyon and areas north and east.
Range
From southern California to mid-Washington is home to our squirrel. Washington, at the northern end of the range, now supports only three widely separated populations: in southern Puget Sound, primarily at Fort Lewis, in the Methow Valley and north shore of Lake Chelan and in the river valleys of Klickitat and Yakima Counties. In recent decades populations have declined seriously due to habitat loss (mature oak/conifer forests), fluctuating food supplies, human activities, domestic animals, disease and illegal hunting.
Can we help?
YES! Our western gray squirrel needs large old live and dead oaks and conifers with cavities near a water supply. Because of its low tolerance for human disturbance -- houses, roads, dogs and cats -- it needs some undeveloped oak-conifer stands. Sympathetic humans can plant groves of oak and nut trees for the future, and avoid cutting oaks for firewood. Landowners can control grazing in areas where oak seedlings exist. For the present, nest boxes (10"x10"x10") with nesting material within may entice some squirrels to stay.
There is a great need for information, education, the will and positive actions by all citizens to ensure that this large but shy native squirrel has a future in our future in Washington. For more information, please contact the Washington Department of Fish and Wildlife. http://www.wa.gov/wdfw/wlm/diversty/soc/threaten.htm
Back to top or back to home page or back to Whats New
By Bill Barmettler, Chehalis River Council
Imagine for a moment that you're walking down the street, minding your own business. A man comes up to you with a clipboard, and says he's taking an opinion poll. You say, "O.K.," and he describes the scene along a spawned-out river, where hundreds of dead, rotting salmon have washed up on the banks. He wants to know what you think about that.
What would you say? What is your opinion regarding the Pacific salmon's tactic of coming back home in droves to spawn and then die? Does it seem strange? Is it just another common fact learned in grade school, and you haven't really thought about it much since then? Lately, fish biologists have been thinking about dead salmon. They've been looking beyond the obvious - that it's a smelly, gross situation - and what they've found has created quite a stir within the communities that are concerned about salmon restoration.
 Patti Barmettler places a carcass near a culvert. Photo by Bill Barmettler. |
In a series of experiments, researchers have proven that salmon carcasses improve the health of the rivers. Our rivers are lacking in nutrients, but the ocean carries lots of nutrition. The returning salmon transfer marine-derived nutrients (MDN) from the ocean to the highest reaches of the watersheds. After dying, their bodies feed everything from algae to bears to the cedar trees along the banks. Each returning fish is, in effect, a care package of food and fertilizer, bringing much-needed materials from the ocean to the rivers and creeks.
Juvenile salmon benefit from their parents' carcasses in several ways. They feed on salmon eggs and spawned-out carcasses. They also benefit from an increased abundance of aquatic invertebrates and increased algal growth. These interrelationships were tested in two small southwestern Washington streams. Salmon carcasses were added to one section of a stream. Compared to the control section, where no carcasses were added, both the size and density of juvenile fish were greatly enhanced. Increased body size improves overwintering ability and survival rates as the young salmon mature from smolt to adult.
Researchers estimate the historic biomass of salmon (that is, before the arrival of European Americans) returning to the Pacific Northwest (Washington, Oregon, California, and Idaho) to have been roughly a quarter million tons. Today, the return is approximately 6 to 7 percent of that amount. In the past the decline of Pacific salmon, gone now from 40% of their historical habitat range, had been treated as an economic or aesthetic loss. Biologists now suspect that salmon depletion is also an enormous ecological loss.
The Washington State Department of Fish and Wildlife has instituted a program that allows volunteers to help address this loss. Called the Stream Nutrient Recovery Program, it provides a mechanism whereby people like you can receive salmon from a local hatchery and put their bodies back in streams and creeks that will benefit from added MDN. It must be emphasized that this is not a replacement for habitat restoration. The program is an effective method to jump-start a stream that's capable of supporting salmon but needs some help. It's a way for you to get involved, and really feel like you did something good for the watershed and the fish. The process goes roughly like this: you call the WDFW, set up an appointment with a gentleman named Hal Michael, and tell him what stream you have in mind, where along this stream you want to place fish, how many you want, etc. There are guidelines for carcass density, so you don't have to guess about that. You sign some paperwork. WDFW staff will check some things out. If your stream is a good candidate and fish are available, your application should be accepted. At the appropriate time of the year you call the hatchery and figure out a good time to get fish. There are some requirements, such as cutting off the tails before you put them in your stream. WDFW will expect a report when you're done.
Two Chehalis River Council members signed up for this program in the year 2000. In November they received fish from the Bingham hatchery, located back in the woods behind Brady on the Satsop River drainage. The guys there were really helpful, but a bit unsure about the whole thing; no private citizens had ever come to the hatchery for carcasses under the nutrient enhancement program. That first year, the carcasses were stuffed under rootwads and into pools. However, it was found that between the river current and the wild animals most of them were pulled back out.
Carcasses were again received in January 2002. This time, the bodies were simply tossed in at a crossing. The situation was monitored to see how well the carcasses were dispersed, or if the next rainstorm dispersed them a little bit too effectively.
The question of how far the bodies will spread downstream is directly related to one of the facets of proper salmon habitat. Good habitat has, among other things, lots of woody debris in the water. If carcasses are placed in a stretch of creek that has no logs, rootwads, or fallen trees in it to catch the bodies, most of them will be gone with the first rainstorm. They'll do good somewhere, but if you put in the effort to haul the fish home, chances are you'll want to see some of them stick around.
The Stream Nutrient Enhancement Program is a great way for people to get involved, to meet some agency and fisheries folks, and to learn something about the salmon life cycle. It's not as gross as it sounds. The carcasses are fresh, so they don't smell bad. If you're careful to isolate the fishy stuff from your street clothes (using rubber boots, raingear, etc.) you'll be fine. This might be a great opportunity for school groups, Scouts, or other organizations working with young adults. For more information contact Hal Michael, Hatcheries Program, WDFW, 600 Capitol Way N, Olympia, WA 98501-1091. michahhm@dfw.wa.gov phone: 1-360-902-2659.
Note: Facts in this article can be found in various articles at Tidepool, http://www.tidepool.org.
Back to top or back to home page or back to Whats New
Well running dry? Water in your basement? Can't get a water right? Your water tastes funny and costs too much? Kids get "swimmers itch"? What is your water issue? The Chehalis Basin Partnership wants to know!
Please join the Chehalis Basin Partnership for an informal meeting to talk about water resources in your area. There will be displays on water quantity, water quality, fish and wildlife habitat, and instream flows. Come mingle, enjoy free pizza, and let local government representatives know what water issues exist in YOUR area. Activities for children will be provided. Open House dates and times are: April 16 from 5-8 pm at Black Hills High School in Tumwater and May 21 from 5-8 pm at Chehalis Middle School. Call Lee Napier at 360-249-4222 for more information.
Back to top
Back to Whats New Index Page
Back to CRC Index Page
This page created and maintained by Chehalis River Council
Send comments or questions to the: Chehalis River Council
