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The Jack Creek Restoration project aims to restore streambank condition, floodplain function, and spawning and rearing habitat for steelhead, Chinook, interior redband and westslope cutthroat. Restoration will be achieved by restoring stream processes in Jack Creek, adding large wood to the stream, revegetating the stream banks and floodplain, relocating nearly one mile of road, and restoring floodplain function in the footprint of the old road.
The project is located in the lowest two miles of Jack Creek, above its confluence with the North Fork Teanaway River at RM 5.9. Click here for a map Jack Creek and its contributing watershed have been subject to historic railroad logging, road building, farming and cattle grazing that have combined over many decades to degrade the channel and floodplain. The contemporary channel is entrenched or incised into what was once a much wider and wetter valley bottom with intermittent stringer meadow habitats.
The goals of this project are to:
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The project is divided into two reaches. Reach 1 is from the confluence of the NF Teanaway up to the county road; Reach 2 is from the county road up to approximately RM 2.0. The entire project area is located on land owned by American Forest Holdings, LLC, and managed by American Forest Land Company, LLC.
The USDA Forest Service is relocating 0.9 mile of FS Road 9738 in August of 2011 and 2012. Mid-Columbia Fisheries will work in concert with the road relocation to fully restore the streambanks and floodplain in the footprint of the old road alignment. Reach 1 work is anticipated in summer of 2012.
The project is supported by the Yakima Tributary Access and Habitat Project (YTAHP), the USDA Forest Service, Overlake Fly Fishing Club, Mid-Columbia Fisheries Enhancement Group, the National Forest Foundation, US Fish and Wildlife Service, the Salmon Recovery Funding Board, and the WA Department of Ecology.
Interfluve completed an assessment of restoration alternatives in lower Jack Creek in December, 2010, and Herrera created draft permit-level plans for Reach 2 in April, 2011. A small working group reviewed those plans in the field in May, 2011, and Herrera prepared a memo summarizing their revised recommendations. These documents are available here:
Restoration alternative assessment