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THE
KARNOWSKY CREEK PROJECT
By Cindy Pandini
The Coast and Cascade Mountain forests of Oregon
are part of a larger maritime ecosystem that extends
from Northern California to the Alaska panhandle.
Highly productive coniferous forests dominate
this area with topography and elevation being
the primary factors that affect local weather
patterns. These weather patterns in turn determine
the amount of precipitation available.
Karnowsky Creek is one of many small, complex
tributaries that flow into the Siuslaw River Estuary,
a mere nine miles from the Pacific Ocean on the
Central Oregon coast. These tributaries and the
surrounding watershed comprise critical habitat
centers for numerous terrestrial and aquatic species,
including salmon, black bear, bobcat, elk, deer,
and many birds. Karnowsky Creek also reveals the
impact historical land uses and the dynamic effects
of nature can have on the ecology of an area.
Years of clear-cutting for farming and logging,
harsh winters, and devastating floods wreaked
havoc on the delicate ecosystem over time. Only
one English walnut remains as a witness to those
settlers who tried to control the creek and the
land around it.
In the fall of 2000, two Forest Service watershed
specialists, Karen Bennett and Johan Hagervorst
walked the Karnowsky Valley with Pete Barrell,
executive director of the Siuslaw Watershed Council.
While hiking along the lower Siuslaw River where
Karnowsky Creek joins the estuary, they noticed
that the creek looked less like a creek and much
more like a wetland. The hillsides surrounding
the area had been clear-cut in recent years and
replanted with fir trees. As the group made its
way up the valley, the character of the landscape
changed. Wetlands became meadow and pasture, and
clear-cut hillsides gave way to densely-forested
mountains of native trees and related habitats.
This visual contrast prompted them to wonder,
what had happened to Karnowsky Creek?
After delving into the history of the area and
with assistance from Bennett and Hagervorst, Barrell
uncovered the answer. In the late 1880s, early
settlers to the area had successfully moved the
creek to the side of the valley in order to clear
the land for cattle grazing. And while the Forest
Service had acquired the land in 1992, the grazing
had continued up until then. On their descent,
the small group began sharing ideas about the
possibilities for restoring the creek to its former
natural state. As a designer with a landscape
architecture background, Barrell became intrigued
with the notion of restoring the landscape.
“The Karnowsky Creek valley bottom landscape
is a typical example of the contemporary condition
of Oregon Coastal valley bottoms,” Barrell
said. “Most have been drained and cleared
in an attempt to create viable productive agriculture
lands. Most exist today as mono-habitats that
are void of the ecological complexity that once
supported a broad spectrum of indigenous species.
Because of the single land ownership of most of
the Karnowsky valley bottom (Forest Service ownership),
this project stood out as an opportunity to take
a community approach to a restoration design challenge
that would have meaning for landscapes far beyond
the Siuslaw.
He came up with the idea of recruiting landscape
architecture students to develop proposals to
address the situation. The idea stemmed from his
experience educationally and professionally as
a designer. Within the world of landscape architecture,
the best approach to a project is through a “charette”
process whereby one facilitates a fast, intensive
design endeavor that results in the production
of a graphically stimulating proposal delineating
one’s design ideas.
With funding help from the Forest Service, six
students were enlisted for an eight-week period
during the summer of 2001 to focus on producing
a restoration design proposal, together with a
grant proposal to fund the restoration efforts.
Each student brought unique skills to the project
and it was through integrated team work that the
design project ultimately proved so successful.
The team gathered a wealth of historical, ecological,
and restoration design information and data for
incorporation into the final document.
The Project
The Karnowsky Creek project exemplifies how critical
partnerships can be to overall project design
and implementation. By combining the interests
of local communities, state and federal governments,
nonprofit partners, and the talents and enthusiasm
of high school and university students, this vision
of a “whole” watershed approach can
be made into reality.
It is exactly the kind of partnership that the
NFF aims to foster throughout its geographic focus
areas: building and catalyzing local efforts in
forest stewardship.
A partnership between the Forest Service, Siuslaw
Soil and Water Conservation District, and the
Siuslaw Watershed Council took the students’
proposal and applied for and received grants of
$350,000 to restore more than two miles of stream
channel and its adjacent wetlands, floodplains
and tidally influenced areas. Both the Oregon
Watershed Enhancement Board and the NFF provided
funding for Phase I of the project, with the Forest
Service contributing funds for planning, design,
and project management.
A new stream channel was built in late summer
and fall of 2002, with plans to divert water from
old drainage ditches into the new channel in 2003.
The second phase of the project will involve the
transportation of large trees by helicopter, for
placement in the floodplain and new channel in
fall 2003. One of the students who worked on the
original proposal, Steve Roelof was later hired
to develop a comprehensive vegetation plan for
the valley. The project also employed local people
along with volunteers and partners to implement
the restoration plan; planting riparian trees,
shrubs, and wetland vegetation. In addition, Paula
Crowder of the Siuslaw Institute, actively engaged
students from the Mapleton School District in
growing native plants on campus and planting them
in the project area. The Mapelton students also
helped by collecting water quality samples and
monitoring ground water wells throughout the project
area.
The project is expected to extend chum salmon
habitat by allowing tidal influence back into
the bottom half mile of the project area. Farther
upstream, Coho salmon will rear in the slower
moving waters of the new channel, adjacent ponds
and floodplain during the summer and the winter.
Farther upstream still, a much steeper part of
the stream will be restored to provide spawning
opportunities for Coho. Karen Bennett, an original
visionary for the project, characterizes the effort
this way: “If we can’t tell the story
of restoration through the Karnowsky Creek project,
we can’t tell it anywhere.”
Currently, teams of planters are planting a range
of native trees and shrubs and wetland species
into valley bottom habitats. A crew of North West
Youth Corp students is making willow cuttings
and planting the banks of the new Karnowsky Creek.
These willows will promote species diversity,
all of which will encourage a healthy creek ecosystem.
The Siuslaw Watershed Council is hosting a series
of one day design charettes to focus on the tributary
systems in Karnowsky Creek and on the restoration
possibilities and alternatives for those riverine
landscapes. The team, including members of the
Siuslaw Watershed Council, Siuslaw National Forest,
Siuslaw Soil and Water Conservation District,
and other community members, are highly interested
in developing a suite of restoration possibilities
for Karnowsky tributaries that are potentially
low-cost and low-impact methods. The big idea
is to set in motion natural restoration processes
that will then unfold through succession over
many years to come.
On a recent visit
to Karnowsky Creek, this writer was struck by
the natural path the little streams and tributaries
took over the landscape. Where once there was
grassy pasture, now there is water and salmon
and birds and the fresh shoots of native shrubs
and trees. And while it is no longer home to the
Karnowsky family, it is home again to the species
with which they once shared the land.
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