Editor's Note
Watershed recovery along the North Coast continues to advance. This issue explores the ways that community projects are leading efforts to restore ailing watersheds. Projects include instream restoration, controlled burns, community organizing, and native plant nurseries. (read more)

Watershed Recovery: Fisheries and Upslope Restoration in the Middle Klamath
The section of the Klamath River watershed from the confluence with the Trinity River up to Iron Gate Dam ranges from wild, rugged, and pristine to settled, roaded, and burned to a crisp. Land jurisdictions are split in the middle with mostly national forest lands and small private and tribal inholdings to the west and checkerboard grading to private agricultural lands in the east. In the past few years, nearly a quarter of this landscape has burned in a series of large wildfires predominantly on the national forest, having both positive and negative effects on the fishery depending on fire intensity and soil type. Anadromous1 runs of salmon and steelhead have continued to struggle with low flows and poor water quality in the Klamath River mainstem and major tributaries, including the Scott and Shasta Rivers. Limiting factors to salmonid production in the Klamath River include lack of instream flow (and subsequent elevated temperatures), access to spawning areas and both summer and winter refugia, elevated rates of fish diseases associated with mainstem dams, and nutrient loading (to name a few). (read more)

Watershed Recovery: Nurturing Coho and Community: A Watershed Nursery Blossoms
SPAWN recently realized our dream to create a watershed-based plant nursery to grow local genetic-stock of plants for our coho and steelhead habitat restoration projects. (read more)

Watershed Recovery: Accelerated Recruitment: A Cost-Effective Approach To Instream Enhancement
Large woody material is critical for enhancing fish habitat, increasing instream biological diversity, and maintaining natural stream processes. Until recently, the South Fork of the Ten Mile River, a salmon-bearing stream in Mendocino County, was generally devoid of large woody material. (read more)

Watershed Recovery: Garcia River Recovery Update
Comprehensive efforts to restore the Garcia River's once-famous runs of salmon and steelhead continue. Garcia River restoration has benefited greatly by lessons learned on watersheds throughout northern California and by techniques taught at Salmonid Restoration Federation Field Schools and Conferences. The Garcia River Total Maximum Daily Load (TMDL) Implementation Plan has assured steady progress on sediment control throughout the watershed. (read more)

Watershed Recovery: 12th Annual Coho Confab August 28-30th

The Coho Confab is a symposium to explore watershed restoration, learn restoration techniques to recover coho salmon populations, and network with other fish-centric people. The 12th Annual Coho Confab will be held on the beautiful Mendocino Coast. Trees Foundation and the Salmonid Restoration Federation are permanent co-hosts of this educational event and this year the Confab is also sponsored by the California Department of Fish & Game (DFG), Mendocino Land Trust, and Trout Unlimited. (read more)

Humboldt Watershed Council Moves Forward
Greetings from the Humboldt Watershed Council. We are honored to submit an essay for this edition and decided to give everyone a little history and an update about what we are up to today. Humboldt Watershed Council is now one of the older and more inclusive environmental groups in Humboldt County. The Humboldt Watershed Council (HWC) was created about 12 years ago to put a spotlight on the intense logging practices of the Pacific Lumber Company (PL) that resulted in damage to water quality, habitat stream conditions, and private property in the Freshwater drainage. The HWC was driven by a collection of residents from the affected area and put its energy into creating a collective voice to the water and forestry agencies, politicians, and the general public. They successfully petitioned the Environmental Protection Agency to list several watersheds as sediment-impaired under 303(d) of the Federal Clean Water Act. During its early years, HWC focused on forestry rules, THP (Timber Harvest Plan) monitoring and litigation, and the Headwaters Forest acquisition, where it played a prominent role in fighting for a scientifically credible HCP/SYP (Harvest Conservation Plan//Sustainable Yield Plan). In about 2002, the HWC focused its energies on the application of the Clean Water Act to our impaired watersheds. It organized public and scientific testimony for Regional Water Board meetings and evidentiary hearings, filed regulatory petitions, participated in mediation, and initiated litigation to force the State and Regional Water Boards to develop the unprecedented Watershed-Wide Waste Discharge Requirements (WWDR) for logging. The concept of WWDR served as the interim measure until Water Quality began development and implementation of today's Total Maximum Daily Load. (read more)

Community-based Forestry: Carbon Comes of Age?
In past articles I have touched on the potential support that payments for ecosystem services can provide for community based forestry. (read more)

Diggin' In: The Gienger Report

Several things are on my mind as mid-summer simmers. In my Spring 2009 "Diggin' In" column, I really focused on the California bond funding `freeze' and it's horrific impacts on organizations, businesses, and individuals involved with watershed restoration work--and the potential for continuing and worsening effects. Well, good news & bad news: the `freeze' thawed enough for many restoration businesses and organizations to have their back invoices finally honored by the state and go-aheads given to recommence certain projects. BUT, California's bond rating was recently pushed into the `sub-basement' so there are certainly no assurances that the work done will be paid for anytime soon. IOUs anybody? The new Association of Conservation Contractors and Workers is meeting on August 1st to try and come to grips with the situation and the future of watershed restoration in California. (read more)

Re-Thinking Water: An Introduction to Greywater

Any wastewater generated in the home, except water from toilets, is called greywater. Dish, shower, sink, and laundry greywater make up 50 to 80 percent of residential "wastewater." It's a shame to lose this precious resource when greywater can be reused for other purposes, especially landscape irrigation. (read more)

Richardson Grove Improvement Project
Kim, (read more)

Wildfire Effects: Lessons to be Learned: Fuel Reduction Programs

On June 21, 2008, lightning ignited what would become known as the American River Complex (ARC) Fire in the Tahoe National Forest. It took firefighters 42 days to bring the fire under control, at which point approximately 20,000 acres were burned. A variety of conditions (complex topography, lack of personnel and resources due to a large number of wildfires burning throughout California at the time, limit on air operations due to dense inversion-caused smoke, and management decisions) led to delays in the control of the wildfire. Throughout most of that period weather conditions were considered to be moderate with relatively high ambient and fuel moisture. However, 27% of the fire burned on a single day. July 9 was dubbed the "blow up day," as it was the day of the fire's hottest temperatures and least humidity. Much of the affected area that day burned at a high severity, or "stand-replacing," level. (read more)

Fire On the Mountain
The Forest Service seems to be learning some lessons from the fire season of 2008­--but it's also reverting to the fire suppression policies which have caused so many problems. (read more)

Salmon River Fire Ecology and History
A Fire Adapted Ecosystem (read more)