Yakima Fish Passage Targeted Investment Projects

The Kittitas County Conservation District continued work in the Wilson-Naneum-Cherry watershed in the Kittitas Valley near Ellensburg to achieve safe fish passage by installing fish screens, removing passage barriers, and planning additional projects. Cumulatively, the watersheds include 394 square miles and approximately 270 stream miles, all with fish passage barriers into their headwaters. Since 2003, ongoing work through the Yakima Tributary Access & Habitat Program (YTAHP) systematically addresses screening and passage needs from the confluence to these upstream tributaries. This project corrected one passage barrier in Naneum Creek and two passage barriers in Coleman Creek, the lowermost barriers in each creek. Working with landowners and irrigators, this project improved on-farm irrigation delivery systems by consolidating and/or rebuilding the diversion structures with fish screen and passage components. The project also finalized designs initiated through YTAHP for the Cascade Irrigation District intersection with Coleman Creek to include a siphon to pass the canal under the stream and rebuild the streambed and irrigation diversion with a fish screen and fishway to allow safe passage. This project benefits mid-Columbia Summer Steelhead, spring Chinook, Coho, and resident species, while ensuring that the agricultural operations remain whole.

Due to circumstances beyond KCCDs control, the remaining barrier at Naneum 3.36 has not yet been removed, but designs developed with this grant are planned for construction in the winter of 2025/26 using Washington State Conservation Commission and Bonneville Power Administration funding. While the fish screen and passage barrier correction designs for Cascade Irrigation District at Naneum and Caribou Creeks were not advanced with this grant, the completion to bid ready documents for the Coleman Creek intersection created the full template for completing these sites as well. The Coleman Creek intersection will be the first project site for Cascade Irrigation District to address fish screening and passage in a tributary and lead to future implementation at the other sites. Funding for the completing these designs will be sought through the Washington State Conservation Commission, Salmon Recovery Funding Board, and/or Brian Abbott Fish Barrier Removal Board at the appropriate time.

The project goal was to work with landowners and irrigators to achieve safe fish passage by installing fish screens, removing passage barriers, and planning additional projects that will improve on-farm irrigation delivery systems by consolidating and/or rebuilding the diversion structures with fish screen and passage components to benefit mid-Columbia Summer Steelhead, spring Chinook and resident species, while ensuring that the agricultural operations remain whole.