DESCRIPTION
Implement Phase 4 of restoration in the NF Farmhouse Reach
The North Fork Nooksack Farmhouse Reach Restoration Project is a multi-phase, reach-scale, engineered log jam (ELJ) project implemented by the Tribe to address North/Middle Fork Nooksack Chinook limiting factors of high channel instability and low habitat diversity. NF/MF Nooksack early Chinook are a genetically unique Chinook population that is essential for ESU recovery, but productivity is critically low. This project implements high priority actions in a high priority reach for NF/MF Nooksack early chinook.
The primary goal of the NF Nooksack Farmhouse reach-scale project (of which this project is the final, fourth phase) is to address early Chinook limiting factors of high channel instability, lack of key habitat, and reduced habitat diversity by restoring habitat conditions and addressing the root causes of habitat degradation, namely the lack of large stable log jams that form and maintain forested islands, floodplain and associated side channels. The restoration approach is to restore the large stable log jams that historically formed and maintained forested islands, floodplain and associated side channels, while planting suitable areas to restore floodplain forest. Restoration is designed to benefit Nooksack early Chinook egg-to emergence and early rearing survival by restoring stable side channels; there will be collateral benefits to other species that use the reach (steelhead, bull trout, coho, chum, sockeye, pink, cutthroat trout). The Farmhouse reach is just upstream from the Kendall hatchery, site of the North Fork/Middle Fork Nooksack early Chinook population rebuilding program, and the reach has the potential to be heavily used, increasing certainty of benefit. Given the forestry-dominated adjacent land use and relative lack of channel constraints, the Farmhouse reach presented an important opportunity to restore habitat-forming processes.
For the Farmhouse Phase 4 Restoration Project, the Nooksack Tribe restored instream and side channel habitat in the North Fork Nooksack River, RM 47-48, near Kendall in Whatcom County. The Phase 4 goals are to address North/Middle Fork Nooksack chinook limiting factors of high channel instability and low habitat diversity. Specifically, this project constructed 55 log jams in a 0.85-mile river segment, completing the fourth and final phase of restoration in the broader Farmhouse reach (RM 46.4-49). Log jams were designed to: (1) increase length of stable side channels available for spawning; (2) form pools and increase habitat diversity; and (3) promote forested island formation and persistence.