Coos Watershed Association

supporting environmental integrity and economic stability within the Coos watershed

PROGRAMS

Assessment & Outreach
In 2005, the Association began its formal outreach program directed to landowners in the Coos Bay Lowland areas surrounding the Coos estuary. These lowland areas are characterized by a higher diversity of private ownership and land uses, as compared to the timber-dominated uplands. The mixture of private land uses, and smaller acreages in these lowland areas make it necessary for the Association to establish communications and working relationships with landowners to achieve watershed restoration goals. Through this program, we hold series of neighborhood Coffee Klatch meetings, where Association staff meet with landowners in their homes to solicit concerns and objectives, introduce and prioritize potential restoration actions, and present assessment results. As a result of our success in completing our Coos Bay Lowlands Assessment and Restoration Plan and Heads-of-Tide Draft Assessment, we will continue to use this model in order to assess and complete restoration planning in other areas of the watershed.

Restoration
Our restoration efforts include fish passage and in-stream habitat improvements, riparian area enhancement, and road-related erosion control. Our restoration projects have a broad representation of landowner partners including small acreage rural residential owners, agriculture operators, timber companies, and the state forest.

Monitoring
Monitoring of our restoration efforts is important to ensure specific project success as well as to guide future restoration priorities and project designs. Through this program we are developing monitoring protocols and tools as well as disseminating the monitoring results in peer reviewed reports.
Our organization is completing scientific monitoring of watershed health benefits that result from our projects. This involves both careful planning, in order to collect the baseline data before a project is completed, and dedication and follow-through in order to collect data over a time frame through which project responses can be measured.

RECENT GRANTS

OWEB Grants Awarded March 2010

-Coos Watershed Stewardship Synergies: Providing teachers and students in the Coos watershed with a better understanding of how a watershed functions, alterations to the watershed and how their actions affect their lives and their communities. Project partners include: OSU Sea Grant Extension, teacher trainers, Northwest Service Academy AmeriCorps and the Coquille Tribal Community Fund. OWEB Funds: $39,213.00, Total Cost: $69,203.00

-Cedar Creek Road Erosion Surveys: Utilizing road survey crews this project will examine 120 miles of roads in the Cedar Creek watershed, located in the Coos River basin. The surveys will identify fish passage, chronic sediment delivery and potential catastrophic fill failure sites. Project partners include: Weyerhaeuser Timber Company and ODFW. OWEB Funds: $46,738.00, Total Cost: $62,339.00

-Upper West Fork Millicoma Baseline Aquatic Habitat Inventory Surveys: Aquatic Habitat Inventory surveys in the upper West Fork Millicoma River and 12 of its named tributaries. Over 15 miles of main stem habitat and 23 miles of valuable tributary habitat will be surveyed. Project Partners Include: ODF, ODFW and Bonneville Environmental Foundation. OWEB Funds: $49,644.00, Total Cost: $66,415.00

-Coho Life History in Tide Gated Coastal Lowland Streams: A continuation of a long-term monitoring study, initiated in 2004 by the Coos Watershed Association and project partners, to examine coho salmon survival, life histories and habitat use in tide gated coastal lowland streams. Project Partners Include: ODFW, ODF, OSU, Port of Coos Bay, the Bonneville Environmental Foundation, and local landowners. OWEB Funds: $169,813.00, Total Cost: $287,862.00

-West Fork Millicoma Habitat Improvements and Road Decommission: Install six engineered log jams in the upper West Fork Millicoma River, fifteen log structures in upper Elk Creek and decommission 1.2 miles of riparian road. Project Partners Include: ODF and ODFW. OWEB Funds: $200,955.00, Total Cost: $313,055.00

-Williams River Watershed Habitat Improvement Phase I: Implement road and drainage improvements on roads along the Williams River located about 20 miles west of Roseburg and 30 miles east of Coos Bay in the Oregon Coast Range. Project Partners Include: Weyerhaeuser Timber Company. OWEB Funds: $147,618.00, Total Cost: $316,685.00

-North Slough Creek Riparian Restoration Project: Work with small agricultural landowners to restore riparian buffers, improve fish passage, and reduce erosion as part of a long-term CREP contract on over 0.8 miles of main stem and tributary stream reaches of North Slough Creek, a tributary to Coos Bay. Project Partners Include: Local landowners and the CREP program. OWEB Funds: $62,058.00, Total Cost: $112,526.00

-Coos Watershed Riparian Establishment Project: Building on the Coos Watershed Association's established riparian restoration program, the project will employ a 3 person crew with a crew leader for two years to establish riparian planting projects by controlling weeds and insuring plant protection is in place. Project Partners Include: ODA and BLM. OWEB Funds: $71,114.00, Total Cost: $103,114.00

Coos Watershed Association :: P.O. Box 5860 , Charleston, Oregon 97420 :: Ph. (541) 888-5922 / Fax (541) 888-6111