Tracking Improvements in Riparian Vegetation
Lack of healthy riparian zones in the South Fork Trinity River basin is causing increased stream temperatures and contributions of sediment from bank erosion. Some of the degradation of riparian zones on agricultural land may have been occurring for over 100 years, but much of the loss of riparian vegetation in forested areas has taken place since 1950.
The extent and nature of past riparian forests along stream channels in the South Fork Trinity River basin is unknown and must be identified before restoration can proceed. Low level aerial photographs can be used to assess current riparian health and to identify changes in conditions over the last 40 years. The earliest photos may in some cases be suitable for determination of desired future conditions for riparian zones. Additional studies are needed to determine the stage of natural recovery of South Fork Mountain tributaries from past landsliding, stream gutting and sedimentation problems (MacCleery, 1974). The recent drought may have allowed a primary canopy of willow and alder to become established, but the possibility of restoring conifers as an over-story needs to be assessed.
In areas affected by logging and landsliding, changes in channel width and riparian cover can be determined using the Riparian Aerial Photographic Inventory of Disturbance (RAPID) assessment technique (Grant, 1988). RAPID uses sequences of aerial photos from different periods to link watershed disturbances to changes in channel width. For example, if stream width has increased from 30 feet to 120 feet, sediment contributions can often be traced to sources on hillslopes, such as landing or road failures. This technique is particularly useful on streams with unconfined channel reaches which are subject to aggradation.
In Hayfork Valley tributaries there is a strong circumstantial link between lack of riparian vegetation and high water temperatures and high levels of fine sediment. Riparian assessment through aerial photo inventory and analysis, in combination with stream temperature monitoring, can help define to what extent lack of shade is contributing to thermal problems.
Monitoring Channel Changes and Channel Recovery
As restoration and healing of the watershed occurs, and through the application of more protective riparian management standards, aggraded stream channels throughout the South Fork Trinity River basin should begin to recover. Pools should scour and channel structure will likely increase in complexity (Lisle, 1981).
The timing of this recovery is largely a function of restoration actions, the application of improved land use practices and the occurrence of storms and floods in the basin. Rates of recovery cannot be predicted, but spatial and temporal trends in channel recovery can be monitored (Madej, 1984). Past sediment movement and changes in sediment storage in the main South Fork Trinity River channel, and its tributaries, has largely been inferred from field observation. Pool depths have only recently been sampled during habitat typing surveys.
Four cross section monitoring sites were recently established in the upper South Fork Trinity River basin as a part of the Shasta-Trinity National Forest fire monitoring program (Veevaert et al., 1991). Data from the few sampling sites were found to be highly subject to local influences and events that may not imply basin-wide changes (Veevaert et al., 1991).
To date, there has been no well defined, basin-wide monitoring strategy developed to trace the course of recovery, or renewed deterioration, of channel conditions throughout the basin, especially in the main channel. Understanding the rate and direction of channel changes in the South Fork Trinity River basin will be essential to developing restoration options and for evaluating eventual basin recovery. For these reasons, a more complete network of channel monitoring sites is needed to quantitatively document changes in residual pool volumes (Lisle, 1987), sediment storage and channel morphology.
Monitoring Changes in Streambed Conditions and Habitat
Obviously habitat typing surveys can be repeated every five or ten years, or after major stream changes, but a more cost effective mechanism is needed to determine gross changes in stream channel conditions and bed materials characteristics. Standard geomorphic measurements and sediment monitoring techniques can be implemented at selected monitoring sites throughout the basin, perhaps at channel cross section sites or at identified spawning areas.
Techniques which might be considered for implementation include scour chains to determine annual depth of bed scour and gravel stability at spawning sites (Nawa et al., 1990), repetitive sediment sampling (eg., McNeil sampling or pebble counts) to monitor changes in bed material composition, and channel mapping to monitor changes in plan form and organic debris loading.
To be effective, each of these monitoring techniques must be defined as an integral part of a larger monitoring effort, with funding and personnel committed to maintaining and remeasuring stations for a period sufficiently long to establish meaningful trends in the data. Monitoring is often an expensive operation and each component of an integrated monitoring plan must provide data that is needed for guiding or evaluating the restoration effort.
Monitoring Watershed Conditions Through Landsat and Aerial Images
Images from Landsat provide large scale views of the landscape and are most valuable for showing changes over a large geographic area in a specified time. If sequences of Landsat images from 1978 to the present are compared, changes in vegetation patterns on sensitive terrain, such as South Fork Mountain, can be seen. The relative rate of recovery of vegetation from the 1987 fires can also be discerned using this technology. The South Fork Trinity River Restoration Program can make use of Landsat imagery to track large scale changes in the basin over time.
At a finer scale, land use monitoring is also needed at a sub-watershed level. A complete database of information on land use can be most effectively collected by taking repetitive, large scale aerial photography of the entire watershed at regular intervals. Photos provide a complete overview of revegetation, landslide activity, storm damage, channel changes, fire effects, harvesting, road construction and other basin changes. The USFS currently contracts for new aerial photography of their lands every five years. We suggest that new photos be taken along the main stem of the South Fork Trinity River following every winter with storm and flood recurrence intervals exceeding five years.
Linking All the Information Together in a GIS
The Klamath River Task Force, in cooperation with the SWRCB, is currently exploring the feasibility of winning cooperation for assembly of a water quality and fisheries data base that can be readily accessed by resource managers and the interested public. The Klamath Coordinated Information System (KCIS) will give fish and water quality data locations using EPA Reach File codes and in some cases display data using a map base (USGS 1:100,000).
Any information system which relates information to a map base is known as a Geographic Information System, or GIS. The system currently being explored for use in the Klamath River basin will operate in a PC environment using Windows. The data base will be DBase IV (or any compatible program) and will use Paradox as a data base manager. Map views and other information relevant to a fish and water quality focused GIS will be accessed through the program PC Arc View. Some agencies, such as the USFS, may use more sophisticated systems such as Unix work stations, but information from this system may be capable of being laterally transferred (Mike Martischang, personal communication).
If all agencies can be tied into a standard of information collection and sharing, cost of data gathering and entry for each agency can be minimized. KCIS will have a bibliographic search function as well as data management capabilities. Agency line staff would have instantaneous access to information related to various streams or water bodies that might otherwise take several days of research. Such a GIS would not only improve the quality of information on which resource decisions are made, but would also save money and staff time. A common system for data acquisition and sharing would also help to alleviate the growing problem of joint management of watersheds that have large sections of both public and private lands. The South Fork Trinity River Restoration Program should track progress on KCIS with interest and encourage agencies in the basin to participate if it shows promise.
An important component of restoration and protection of natural resources is an educated public. Ideally, people should have a basic understanding of their watershed, such as its rock and soil types, plant and animal life, and the ways these components can influence each other. Equally important is knowledge about the economics and politics of natural resource management. Watershed management is interdisciplinary, and if the citizens of a watershed are to be good stewards, their school education should prepare them with a well rounded curriculum designed toward that goal. Stream and watershed field studies also provide an excellent opportunity for "hands on" education where the local environment becomes the living laboratory. As students explore their environment, they may be able to contribute significantly to the base of scientific information for the restoration program.
Many of the basins long time residents are already excellent stewards and have implemented water or soil conservation measures or riparian restoration. Adult education can use field tours to model demonstration sites and to promote sharing of information within the agricultural community of the Hayfork Valley. In the Salmon River basin in Siskiyou County, a community based education program designed to stop poaching has met with success and could be duplicated in the South Fork Trinity River basin. As the CRMP tries to promote direct employment of the basin's citizens in restoration activities, it will want to promote focused training sessions on topics such as implementation of erosion prevention and control techniques.
Fisheries and Watershed Education in Public Schools
School-based education is important for forming attitudes that determine what is done with knowledge. A curriculum that provides students with many opportunities to help their watershed, by gathering and sharing information about it, or by actively restoring and protecting it, will develop caring attitudes from which stewardship arises. A school curriculum that focuses on natural resources will find its way into the community at large, since children bring their experiences and knowledge home to relatives and neighbors. Young people often provide the impetus and energy for change.
The Trinity River Restoration Program exists in part because of the focused attention of a group of young people. Concerned and angry about declining steelhead runs, these Trinity High School students buried the symbolic "last steelhead" to call attention to a situation they thought was important. They carried their message to Washington D.C., and the impression they left with Congress helped to bring the Trinity River Basin Fish and Wildlife Restoration Act into existence (Jim Smith, personal communication).
Klamath River Education Program and Adopt-A-Watershed
Both the Trinity River Restoration Program and the Klamath Fisheries Restoration Program have invested in educational programs for schools. In 1989, the Klamath Program began funding for a K-12 fisheries curriculum and teacher training program. The Klamath River Educational Program (KREP) has produced the curriculum guides for grades 4-12 and is scheduled to complete the K-3 grade materials by 1995. The KREP has conducted four summer institutes, for teachers and for high school students. During the week long institutes, participants tour the Klamath River Basin and gain first hand knowledge about restoration issues. The KREP also maintains a lending library of slide shows, videos, curriculum materials and field equipment.
In 1990, the Trinity River Restoration Program provided the first of three years of funding for The Adopt-A-Watershed Program. The program was born in Hayfork, but has been implemented much more widely throughout Trinity County and the state. It is an integrated K-12 program that focuses on the watershed, and all its components. The curriculum includes the study of geology, wildlife, forestry, ecosystems and resource management. When completed, there will be two units of study for every grade level.
Fisheries and river ecosystems are the topics of units at the primary, upper elementary, middle school, and high school levels. Much of the material used for these units was developed specifically for the Klamath River basin by the KREP, so it is very topical and relevant to students' lives.
The Adopt-A-Watershed program has implemented the Salmonids in the Classroom project (Pero, 1992) where students rear salmon and steelhead in aquariums. Unfortunately, fish from Trinity River Hatchery have been transplanted into Hayfork Creek tributaries after being reared from the egg to fry stage in classrooms. While planting fish in an adopted stream may seem an important symbolic gesture of caring, in actuality it could transmit diseases to local fish populations.
The Adopt-A-Watershed Program, when it becomes widely implemented, will help citizens of the South Fork to make wise resource management decisions. The curriculum links students with real science by involving them in classroom and field studies that are meaningful. Students begin to observe and monitor their watershed in kindergarten, and create a watershed data base that grows each year. Many of the activities bring students into contact with resource management professionals, who can serve as career role models.
Restoration efforts in the South Fork should include support for the Adopt-A-Watershed Program. Since there is an emphasis on field work and natural resource careers, schools that are implementing this program must have strong support from the community and especially from resource agencies. Partnerships between schools and agencies should be honored with a long term commitment. Links between the local job training center and the high school could provide a labor pool for local restoration contractors.
Partnerships allow agency personnel to help teachers with technical assistance in the field or in the classroom. Without the help of knowledgeable professional, most teachers will be unable to get the most benefit from this program. Educators look to the geologists, foresters, soil scientists, fisheries biologists and other experts for information and guidance in conducting experiments and long term studies. The amount and quality of this type of support will determine the quality of what is being taught. Students can also directly contribute important information on fisheries and water quality if provided proper equipment and direction.
Redd counts and carcass counts could both include volunteers from Hayfork High School. Etna High School students have recently become involved in Scott River fall chinook salmon surveys and are contributing valuable information to the U.S. Forest Service, California Department of Fish and Game and the Klamath Restoration Program (Sue Mauer, personal communication). Weaverville high school students were involved in similar surveys.
Water quality may also be a suitable focus for high school chemistry and biology students. The Trinity Restoration Program might consider purchasing water quality monitoring equipment for such efforts if there is interest at Hayfork High School. Students at Discovery High School in Yreka have begun to monitor Yreka Creek as a "hands on" learning opportunity for their students. Teachers and students may also be successful in securing grant funds from outside the restoration program. Piner High School in Santa Rosa won a $200,000 grant from the EPA to help monitor water quality in Santa Rosa Creek and to improve community awareness of urban and suburban non-point source pollution.
Even elementary school students can gather important information about streams. Continuous reading temperature recording devices, such as the Hobo Temps meter, can be acquired for under $100 and placed in a stream to record hourly temperatures for over a year. Precision data is collected and automatically transferred to computer and could be used in classroom activities like basic exercises in graphing. This information could also be shared in the local GIS if one comes on line. Such information might help provide pieces of a comprehensive temperature survey for many locations for which no current information exists.
Elementary and high school students can also help directly in restoration projects. Seventh and eight grade students from Sisson Elementary school in Mt. Shasta planted 2600 trees on the Shasta River as part of a Trout Unlimited restoration project. Students from Montague School have also adopted a section of the Little Shasta River and have embarked on a riparian restoration project as part of KREP. Other KREP students from Dorris have worked with the Klamath National Forest, Goose Nest Ranger District, to help restore riparian zones in mountain meadows at the headwaters of the Little Shasta River.
If the Cooperative Resource Management Planning (CRMP) process is successful in Hayfork, it will serve as an educational project in itself. For example, agency staff and scientists will have an opportunity to learn from experienced, long time basin residents, and residents will become aware of the most recent scientific advances in fisheries management. Sharing of information between all factions should help create a blend of ideas that helps with community development while improving fisheries and water quality. The CRMP should take the lead in community education through field tours and other forums.
The Trinity River Bioregional Group and the pre-CRMP that has formed in the South Fork Trinity Basin have already used field tours to promote public awareness. The U.S. Forest Service Watershed demonstration project in Butter Creek was explained to the public through a bus tour in late 1993. Tours of the Jesse Ranch in the Hayfork Valley showed the benefits of spring development for improving grazing areas without depleting stream flows.
Similar tours could show farmers and ranchers how improvements in irrigation technology could make sense for their business while helping improve water supply for their neighbors and improving fisheries and water quality. Experiments should also be carried out, and results shared with the public, with new crops that might yield higher economic value while using less water. Riparian restoration can also prevent loss of valuable agricultural land and successful demonstration sites should be the site of field tours.
Coordination should begin immediately to get training for the work force that will be needed for implementation of erosion control and prevention measures on USFS lands. The pre-CRMP has already helped promote a field training for equipment operators at demonstration sites on Pacific Lumber Company land. As the USFS completes more erosion prevention and control projects, private timber land owners can be invited on field tours to see how such measures could help preserve the silvicultural productivity of their land and better protect water quality. The CCC can also provide a valuable labor pool for any restoration activities in the South Fork Trinity River basin so educational efforts should also target this group.While poaching may have been greatly reduced in recent years in the South Fork Trinity River basin, a community forum on this topic might be held patterned after the successful Salmon River model promoted by the Klamath Restoration Program (see Chapter VII). Chapter 15