The Calapooia, South Santiam, and North Santiam Watershed Councils have developed a partnership with Meyer Memorial Trust and Bonneville Environmental Foundation to model a collaborative approach between regional watershed councils in developing and implementing an adaptive restoration strategy.
Mission: Thinking and collaborating regionally to build capacity for work locally.
Vision: Clean healthy waters with ecological flows, native species recovered and diverse, floodplain connectivity and healthy riparian forests, as well as stable economies with working landscapes that support local populations, and communities that sustain those natural resources. The vision’s foundation is sustained by educated youth and adults who behave as stewards of their watershed resources and prioritize investment into their local economies.
Our Past, Present, and Future
Our Watershed Councils began exploring partnership opportunities four years ago to expand our capacities while recognizing an economy of scales where our work overlaps. We built the “Landowner Recruitment for Restoration” on three common priorities: (1) riparian shade, (2) fish habitat and (3) education and outreach to recruit projects. Since this regional program’s inception, we have secured over a half-million dollars in grant funds to restore native riparian vegetation and in-stream habitats on 303(d) and essential salmonid habitat listed streams.
As we learn more about each others’ councils and watersheds, our reasoning for partnering is reaffirmed. The Santiam and Calapooia Watersheds have similar landscapes, land uses and stakeholders; and our priority habitat concerns, species and watershed processes that require restoration are also similar. Our Watershed Councils’ views on natural resource management and conservation coincide.
There is opportunity to tailor this work and target actions that restore ecosystem processes, addressing causes of habitat degradation on a larger scale. Our next major goal is to augment our Councils’ capacities to establish a monitoring program that evaluates our restoration progress so we can utilize adaptive management to improve our effectiveness in addressing long-term ecological objectives for the three watersheds and the region.
Common Restoration Priorities
Primary Restoration Priorities
- Aquatic/In-Channel Habitat- including substrate conditions, channel complexity, connectivity and off channel
- Floodplain/Riparian Habitats- including canopy, plant diversity, large wood recruitment and channelization
- Fish Species Recovery
Secondary Restoration Priorities
- Water Quantity and Quality
- Wetlands
- Upland Habitat
Common Strategies
- Prioritize tributaries, stream reaches and processes – using watershed assessments, GIS data, agency priorities and documents (e.g. TMDL plan) and technical advisor input.
- Focus on in-stream and riparian areas first and move upland – to provide a landscape treatment that addresses entire watershed ecosystem.
- Collect additional data to identify specific project locations and recruit landowners – to promote strategic and contiguous restored areas.
- Provide connectivity – reconnecting waterways, streams with floodplains, restored habitats and restored processes to increase effectiveness in addressing causes of watershed processes degradation.
- Long-term maintenance and stewardship to protect investment – by supporting landowners and assisting with resources necessary to maintain project sites.
- Monitor to evaluate effectiveness and adapt strategies as needed – to inform and improve restoration strategies while providing accountability to watershed communities.