Overview: The Tucannon River basin is located in Southeast Washington State in Columbia and Garfield counties. The Tucannon River flows north out of the Blue Mountains into the Snake River, and is the ancestral boundary between the Confederated Tribes of the Umatilla Indian Reservation and the Nez Perce Tribe.  The system-wide restoration objective for the Tucannon River is to improve habitat conditions for Endangered Species Act (ESA) listed species (Snake River Spring Chinook and Steelhead) for all life history stages.  It is expected that improved habitat conditions will lead to an increase in the abundance of listed species returning to the river.  Increasing abundance will lead to de-listing of the species, which is the overall recovery goal for the system.  Previous efforts (CCD 2004; SRSRB 2006) have identified the habitat-limiting factors associated with the decline of ESA-listed populations.

The Tucannon watershed supports the only remaining population of Spring Chinook (Oncorhynchus tshawytscha) in the lower Snake River. Early fish estimates show the Tucannon once produced thousands of salmon annually, but currently produces only a few hundred adult Spring Chinook each year.  In 1992, Spring Chinook were listed as threatened under the Endangered Species Act as runs declined to less than 200 adult fish.  Past land use practices including logging, livestock grazing, irrigated agriculture and construction of the Tucannon Lakes in addition to recent large forest fires in the headwaters have created conditions in the Tucannon River that have over-simplified the stream channel and drastically reduced the potential to produce a sustainable Chinook population.  Channel simplification caused by channel confinement (levees, lakes, roads) and straightening (pushing the channel to the valley wall) has led to a loss of floodplain connectivity (channel incision), increased stream velocities, and loss of pool habitat. These factors have combined to decrease quality habitat for adult and juvenile Spring Chinook salmon, steelhead, and Bull Trout, leaving these unique populations at risk.

Background: To address the Ecological Concerns associated with Spring Chinook salmon in the Tucannon, BPA set up a Programmatic Habitat Project in the Tucannon in 2010. The programmatic provides the forum, basis for communication and coordination, and the necessary funding to implement in-channel, riparian, and floodplain habitat projects. The Snake River Salmon Recovery Board (SRSRB) manages the BPA Tucannon River Programmatic Habitat Project (2010-077-00) through a parent contract for operations support, management organization, implementation assistance, and reporting described in this summary. The goal of the Tucannon River programmatic is to restore floodplain function and natural channel processes in the spring Chinook priority restoration reaches of the Tucannon River, leading to improved population productivity and abundance.

The CTUIR will manage this contract as a contribution in support of programmatic goals, consistent with the CTUIR River Vision: a desired riverine system that is shaped and maintained by the dynamic interactions and interconnections of its natural physical and ecological processes. The restoration actions proposed for implementation in the prioritized river segments promote and enhance the interconnected nature of the five primary touchstones of the Tribes' River Vision: a) hydrology, b) geomorphology, c) connectivity, d) riparian community, and e) aquatic biota.  

The implementers in the Tucannon, working with local, tribal, state, and federal partners over the course of several years, had already been developing the Tucannon River Geomorphic Assessment & Habitat Restoration Plan (Anchor QEA, Apr 2011) for the watershed. Completed in 2011, this Restoration Strategy or Framework has been used to identify and prioritize stream reaches and restoration actions which would best improve habitat for salmonids. Focusing on the high priority areas for Tucannon spring Chinook, the plan coordinated the development of a habitat restoration prioritization for the Tucannon River from RM-20 upstream to RM-50; the implementers continued to work with the Snake River Salmon Recovery Board (SRSRB), through the Tucannon River Programmatic Habitat project, and extended the Tucannon River restoration plan from RM-20 downstream to the confluence of the Snake River. The plan (Anchor QEA, Nov 2011) has prioritized projects into three Tiers (1-3) based on the projected effects of implementation as a benefit to Snake River spring Chinook, and is now used to guide focused restoration in the Tucannon to garner the greatest benefits possible in each restoration project.

More recently, the Northwest Power and Conservation Council has started a process for summarizing Ecological Concern information across the basin with centralized metric reporting.  The list below shows the selected list of Ecological Concerns and those that affect the Tucannon Basin:

1.  Lack of Stream Complexity    
2.  Altered Sediment Dynamics    
3.  Fish Passage Barriers
4.  Altered Hydrology
5.  Degraded Water Quality
6.  Poor Riparian Condition
7.  Lack of Floodplain Connectivity

The Tucannon Conceptual Restoration Plan (Columbia Conservation District, 2011) highlights basinwide project implementation projects in a stepwise, logical, prioritized fashion. To ensure successful implementation of the plan, and to integrate with other reporting efforts at a larger basin scale, a coordinated monitoring strategy is critical to show restoration project effectiveness to stakeholders and direct future habitat actions for project implementers towards addressing the most limiting factors.  To facilitate these objectives, we have established a coordinated BPA monitoring approach that informs effective project implementation.
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Project Summary:  Project Area 3 (PA-3) is a large scale/scope salmon habitat restoration project identified in the previous restoration plans completed by Anchor QEA (2011). The project reach is 1.85 miles in length, located on the State of Washington, on the WT Wooten Wildlife Area from ~RM-48.65 to approximately RM-46.8 on the Tucannon.  The overall project goal in PA-3 is to improve floodplain connectivity through channel aggradation by increasing channel complexity and reconnecting historic channels. Objectives for the project are to: a) place LWD for habitat complexity and instream roughness to aggrade the channel and increase connectivity; and b) increase channel complexity through additional wood placements.  

Recommended restoration actions include: (1) protect and maintain natural processes (i.e., maintain natural channel and floodplain processes through the project area), (2) reconnect isolated habitats (i.e. no significant isolated habitats would be directly modified in this project area), (3) place Large Wood in the plane-bed sections of the channel, and (4) restore riparian processes. These identified restoration actions in the project area address problems associated with the current single-thread channel containing both plane bed and forced pool-riffle sections.  Addressing these actions will restore floodplain processes and add complexity to the simplified channel form.

Objectives (FY19): In this contract period, goals are to: a) increase LWD for habitat complexity and to improve stream channel form and function; b) increase proper floodplain structure/connectivity through supplemental wood placements. Additional wood placement to supplement and maintain the original habitat objectives will: force pools and hydraulic variability in the plane-bed channel sections, decrease instream velocities, provide additional hydraulic complexity in the deep, incised sections, and promote development of a more complex channel networks throughout this reach. Project goals in this reach are still to restore habitat function, improve channel structure and complexity, promote floodplain connectivity, and reactivate historic side-channels. The addition of more structure in the initial LWD placement areas, and the supplementation of wood in existing structures, will support retention of additional LWD, and induce aggradation of the bed over-time -- increasing floodplain connection, easing channel confinement, and allowing for better floodplain function by promoting channel migration within the reconnected floodplain area during high flows.
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Prior (FY18): The initial restoration project focused on instream habitat restoration, these treatments included construction of instream habitat features such as engineered log jams (ELJs), removal of infrastructure such as spoils material and artificial embankments, and the installation of riparian plantings to induce naturally occurring repair, restoration, and recovery of both floodplain and riparian zone function and processes. Treatments focused on increasing in-channel complexity through the placement of LWD to promote roughness, reduce channel confinement, increase habitat complexity, and induce floodplain reconnection through the aggradation of the streambed; these outcomes have worked well, but the gravel deposition buried some of the large wood material and others were lost through natural movement, therefore its necessary to do some additional maintenance in the project area to meet the Program's objectives for the Tucannon of >2 pieces of large wood per channel width.

Initial restoration actions, which included wood placement to improve channel complexity and floodplain connectivity, were completed at PA-3 during the Summer 2014 under BPA contract support for the CTUIR in FY14 (#62642). The initial project phase added 225 trees via helicopter and 393 trees and 280 boulders via ground based equipment, the project performed well and subsequently aggraded the channel 4-5 feet making it possible to reconnect additional side channels that were deemed too high to reconnect in the initial project.  This Phase I project performed so well that it lost (through burial) a large percentage of its large wood, and no longer meets the Tucannon objective of >2 key pieces per channel width.

In FY18, the CTUIR deemed that additional work could be completed to further address the goal of floodplain connectivity with additional large wood placements to further aggrade the channel and naturally reconnect additional side-channels not previously reconnected due to channel incision.  The project measured with rapid habitat surveys shows significant progress since 2014.  In July 2014, pre-project data showed; 108 LWD, 29 pools, 0.34 miles perennial side channel, 0.0 miles of high flow channel and 1.7 miles of total perennial stream channel.  In August 2014, after project completion, post-project data showed; 389 LWD, 51 pools, 0.34 miles perennial side channel, 0.0 miles of high flow channels and 1.7 miles of total perennial stream channel.  In September 2017, rapid habitat was assessed and showed; 327 LWD, 50 pools, 0.68 miles perennial side channel, 0.27 miles of high flow channel and 2.04 miles of total perennial stream channel.  

While this in and of itself is success, several large side channels were not reconnected and the goal of >2 pieces of large wood per channel width were no longer achieved.  This led to the idea of completing additional maintenance in the project area to again meet the Tucannon restoration goals. In 2018, CTUIR used the River Complexity Index (Brown, 2002) to assess the current condition of PA-18 and determined the pieces of large wood per channel width was 1.59 (goal of >2).  Current condition also showed; main channel length of 8,242 feet, total channel length (main+side channels) of 10,827 feet and an RCI value of 18.93.  The current FY18 project will add an additional ~400 pieces of large wood to the project area to further increase aggradation in the project area to reconnect previously unconnected long side channels.  This uplift shows the pieces of large wood per channel width would increase to >2, channel length of 8,242 feet, total channel length (main+side channel) of 15,287 feet and an RCI value of 27.84 which is a 47% increase in the existing 2017 conditions, further justifying this additional work in PA-3.
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Project History (2014):  Enhancing and restoring instream habitat in this project area will be accomplished through a variety of treatment actions in the main channel, along the banks, and within the floodplain. These treatments include construction of instream habitat features such as engineered log jams (ELJs), removal of infrastructure such as spoils material and artificial embankment, and the installation of riparian plantings.  The principal benefits of project implementation will be restoration of historic spring Chinook spawning, rearing, and migration corridor habitats.  The associated treatment of riparian areas is expected to induce naturally occurring repair, restoration, and recovery of both floodplain and riparian zone function and processes.

(a) Expected Implementation Actions (from the 30% Conceptual Design):  Reconnect isolated habitat within several areas with the project reach through the removal and set back of river levees.  Remove and set back approximately 2,530 feet of levees in three locations to re-establish floodplain connectivity to approximately 1.32 acres of low floodplain.   Install ELJs and other LWD to increase channel complexity over a ¾ mile reach.  Re-plant adjacent floodplain and riparian areas; re-vegetate and restore disturbed construction access sites and staging areas.  

(b) Geomorphic Implications:  Setting back infrastructure will allow a wider corridor for channel migration and accessible floodplain area. Increased connectivity with the low-lying floodplain will lead to decreased channel velocities during high flows and dispersion of sediment across the floodplain.  Addition of LWD will initiate a geomorphic response resulting in bed scour and sorting of sediment, which forms critical habitat features (e.g., pools, cover, and spawning gravels).  Because the channel profile is controlled by man-made features and bedrock, the wood placements are not expected to significantly affect the channel grade. However, the ELJs will influence the development of additional pools and depositional areas in the plane-bed sections of the channel. In addition, large wood structures will promote development of a more complex channel network by splitting flow, initiating gravel bar and island development, and promoting channel migration within the reconnected floodplain area.

(c) Biological Benefits:  Immediate biological benefits of the project include decreased instream velocities during high flows from better connectivity with the floodplain, and pool development and cover provided by the LWD placements. As the channel is able to establish a more complex planform through the reconnected floodplain, more diverse habitat areas will be available to increase the carrying capacity for juvenile salmonids. Deposition of sediment and formation of side channels will create additional spawning area. Over time, greater floodplain connectivity will also lead to a healthier riparian zone and, in turn, promote improved ecosystem processes and habitat function.