Draft of Chehalis Basin Aquatic Species Restoration Plan Released

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On Monday the state released the formal draft of a plan that’s intended to help recover aquatic species and their habitat throughout the Chehalis Basin. The plan keeps a particular eye toward the recovery of Chinook salmon, and with good reason.

In the first paragraph of its press release the Washington Department of Fish and Wildlife noted that over the last 30 years salmon runs in the Chehalis River have declined by 80 percent. Those staggering losses have been blamed on habitat degradation, development, and climate change. The press release goes on to state that spring Chinook, the iconic species of the region, could become “functionally extinct, by the end of the century.

The Chehalis basin is one of the state’s only major river systems with no salmon species listed as threatened or endangered, said Emelie McKain, the basin’s aquatic restoration plan manager for WDFW. We want to keep it that way by restoring and protecting their habitat.

With those goals in mind, a collection of scientists, researchers, and technical experts in the field have combined to produce the draft aquatic species restoration plan. The proposals in that plan are supposed to help restore spawning, rearing, and feeding grounds for salmon and other endemic aquatic species throughout the 3,400 miles of perennial streams and rivers within the Chehalis Basin. According to McKain, the basin is home to the largest diversity of amphibians in Washington, including the federally-threatened Oregon spotted frog.

Logging and development have historically led the way for habitat degradation but scientists warn that climate change is now creating winter storms of greater frequency and intensity. Those storms create massive river flows that scour rivers and streams, leaving them devoid of organic material and fine gravel that is is essential to proper habitat conditions. Likewise, summertime droughts are also becoming more common, and lasting for longer periods of time. Droughts leave stream flows low and make fish passage problematic while simultaneously raising water temperatures beyond levels that are safe for salmon and other aquatic species.

The draft restoration plan calls for voluntary cooperation with willing landowners and, according to a press release, highlights potential actions that would contribute to the following outcomes:

Support healthy, harvestable salmon populations.



Build robust, diverse populations of other native fish and aquatic species.

Foster productive ecosystems more resilient to climate change and human-caused stressors.

Implementation of the plan will be assisted by a team of contributors from entities such as the Quinault Indian Nation, Confederated Tribes of the Chehalis Reservation, WDFW, and Washington Department of Ecology. Additional help will be provided by participating farmers, foresters, and conservationists, along with state and federal agencies, and local governments.

The public is encouraged to provide comments on the proposal so that the Chehalis Basin Board can use the feedback during future development and implementation processes. That board was established by the state legislature in order to provide consistent long-term oversight over the Chehalis Basin Strategy. The overall Chehalis Basin Strategy is a combination of aquatic species protections and efforts to make the basin more resilient to flooding.

Additional information regarding the Chehalis Basin Strategy can be found online at ecology.wa.gov/About-us/Get-to-know-us/Our-Programs/Office-of-Chehalis-Basin/Strategy. Public comments will be accepted through Jan. 14, 2020. Comments can be submitted online at chehalisbasinstrategy.com/asrp/asrp-phase-i-draft-plan/.