DESCRIPTION
Riparian habitats are the most fundamental building block for protecting aquatic freshwater and marine ecosystems and the species that depend on them. Virtually all watershed assessments and species recovery plans from landscape to reach to watershed scales call for improving riparian habitat quality/quantity and reducing their increasing fragmentation. The project seeks to build on work from Phase 1 of this project, Southern Hood Canal Riparian Enhancement. This project would continue to fund one Washington State Conservation Corps (WCC) crew for multiple years to implement the project scope. Additional private contractors may be hired to perform some of the tasks where necessary. The tasks of the project scope are: 1) tree planting 2)maintenance for existing riparian plantings 3) invasive, non-native vegetation inventory and control 4) instream and estuarine restoration such as hand placement of woody debris and removal of invasives 5) implementation assessment Goal: Improve the quality and quantity of riparian buffers. Focus will be in, but not limited to, the Skokomish and Lilliwaup Watersheds. Objective: Move riparian areas toward a later seral stage by planting native conifers, shrub and hardwood species.
Riparian habitats are the most fundamental building block for protecting aquatic freshwater and marine ecosystems and the species that depend on them. Virtually all watershed assessments and species recovery plans from landscape to reach to watershed scales call for improving riparian habitat quality/quantity and reducing their increasing fragmentation. This project built on work from Phase 1, Southern Hood Canal Riparian Enhancement Project (Project #09-1665). This project continued to fund one restoration field crew for multiple years to implement the project scope. Additional private contractors were hired to perform some of the tasks where necessary. The tasks of the project scope completed were: 1) tree/shrub planting, 2) maintenance of riparian plantings, and 3) invasive, non-native vegetation inventory, control, and native revegetation. The goal of this project was to restore natural riparian function within the Skokomish Watershed. The objectives that resulted in the realization of the project goal included: 1) improve the quantity of riparian habitats available by expanding existing riparian buffers and planting riparian areas that are currently unvegetated; 2) improve the quality of riparian habitats by controlling invasive species and replanting with native vegetation; and 3) move riparian areas toward a later seral stage by implementing riparian conifer underplantings. Species affected by this project were threatened Puget Sound Chinook Salmon, Puget Sound Steelhead, and Puget Sound Bull Trout.