Bedrock Creek Habitat Improvement

The Nez Perce Soil and Water Conservation District will design and construct habitat treatments on a 0.54 mile segment of Bedrock Creek located 0.34 miles upstream from the confluence of Bedrock Creek and the Clearwater River. Current habitat conditions include lack of woody material, lack of riparian vegetation and a partially disengaged floodplain. The woody materials and riparian vegetation were removed during a wildland fire in 2021. Project actions prescribed to increase juvenile salmon and steelhead include 1) installation of engineered log jams, bank roughening structures, and other woody debris structures to improve channel roughness, complexity and juvenile steelhead refugia, 2) installation of wood structures on the floodplain to increase floodplain roughness, trap debris, and mitigate for increased post fire runoff and 3) grass seeding and plantings of native herbaceous and woody species to rehabilitate the riparian zone, and 4) planting trees and grass on upland slope to reduce erosion and provide long term slope stability.



Project actions prescribed to increase habitat capacity for juvenile steelhead include: 1) install engineering log jams, bank roughening structures and other wood debris structures throughout the stream and graded areas to provide channel structure, complexity and roughness, 2) streambank stabilization through use of logs and plantings, and 3) revegetation through grass seeding and planting native trees/shrubs along riparian zones.

Improving the project site through development of a restored floodplain will increase the stream’s processes and function. Developing habitat complexity in the form of woody debris structures and planting of riparian zones will improve survival of juveniles in summer rearing months and overwintering as well. An established riparian zone will provide long-term sources of woody debris, food sources for macro-invertebrates and provide shade to the stream to lower stream temperatures and improve summer juvenile steelhead survival. The conceptual design addresses the juvenile steelhead summer and overwintering life stages through the development of instream habitat and floodplain diversity.