FY 2022 North Fork Stillaguamish Floodplain Protection

This project provided partial funding to purchase two floodplain parcels (both Chapman) of 11.22 acres of high-quality floodplain habitat along the North Fork Stillaguamish and protected it from degradation (logging, development, stream bank armoring, etc.), and provides a location for future instream and riparian restoration projects along more than 2080 feet of stream channel (PCSRF pro-rated metrics are a portion of this total, the FY22 prorated metrics for this funding are 6.40 acres protected on 0.22 miles of the channel). In the Stillaguamish, it has been difficult to find willing landowners to implement the quantity of instream and floodplain projects needed to achieve Chinook recovery goals. Therefore, the Tribe has been acquiring the lands needed to achieve the habitat restoration goals outlined in the Stillaguamish Chapter of the Puget Sound Chinook Recovery Plan.

The goal of the project is to protect 11.22 acres of high quality floodplain habitat along the North Fork Stillaguamish from degradation (logging, development, stream bank armoring, etc.), and provide a location for future instream and riparian restoration projects along more than 2080 feet of stream channel (PCSRF pro-rated metrics are a portion of this total, details above). In the Stillaguamish it has been difficult to find willing landowners to implement the quantity of instream and floodplain projects needed to achieve Chinook recovery goals. Therefore, the Tribe has been acquiring the lands needed to achieve the habitat restoration goals outlined in the Stillaguamish Chapter of the Puget Sound Chinook Recovery Plan.



Purchasing, protecting, and restoring (eventually) the parcels will reverse the continued decline of instream habitat conditions for Stillaguamish Chinook and other salmonids. Depressed Chinook returns to the Stillaguamish have excluded direct tribal harvest for several decades, and limit harvest opportunities across the Pacific Northwest. This has severely restricted the Treaty Rights of the Stillaguamish and other treaty tribes.



The acquisition strategy addendum to the Stillaguamish Recovery Plan calls for the purchase of more than 7000 acres along the mainstem, North, and South Fork Stillaguamish, primarily in the floodplain. The goal of the strategy is to acquire a corridor of lands along the Chinook bearing waters of the Stillaguamish. This will allow the restoration of unrestricted riverine processes, which are central to achieving the restoration targets detailed in the Recovery Plan. The proposed project will make incremental progress towards the acquisition goals.