Potlatch River Steelhead Monitoring and Evaluation (PRSME)

Idaho Department of Fish and Game (IDFG) will continue the long-term umbrella monitoring effort within the Potlatch River basin. The Potlatch River Steelhead Monitoring and Evaluation (PRSME) project provides effectiveness monitoring of habitat restoration actions at the watershed scale in the Potlatch River. Limiting factors and steelhead population metrics identified through the project inform recovery actions of ESA-listed Snake River Basin steelhead identified in the NOAA 2017 recovery plan. Previous work has been funded through PCSRF and NOAA Intensively Monitored Watershed (IMW) Funds.

The PRSME framework provides: 1) Potlatch River steelhead production and productivity data on multiple scales, 2) effectiveness monitoring for numerous habitat restoration projects, 3) an effective method for identifying additional high priority habitat restoration projects in the basin, and 4) valuable trend monitoring in the Lower Mainstem Clearwater River steelhead population (Clearwater River Major Population Group (MPG)).

The PRSME represents the monitoring and evaluation component of the Potlatch River Watershed Management Plan 2019 Amendment. Monitoring is conducted annually at four primary worksites: East Fork Potlatch River (56.5 miles monitored), Big Bear Creek (63.0 miles monitored), Pine Creek (6.1 miles monitored), and West Fork Potlatch River (77.3 miles monitored).

The goal of the PRSME project is to evaluate fish and habitat responses to habitat restoration projects in the Potlatch River basin. The project is designed to assess responses at multiple scales: 1) a broad-scale monitoring effort to document steelhead population response within index watersheds (Big Bear Creek and East Fork Potlatch River), 2) a finer-scale effort to assess fish and habitat response to restoration projects at the tributary level, and 3) reach-scale monitoring to assess whether individual projects produced the intended outcome. The design allows managers to better understand the relationship between a habitat action and fish response and how localized responses to restoration propagate up to a higher, management-scale level. The PRSME monitoring objectives are:



1. Assess steelhead production and productivity within the index watersheds

a. Determine abundance of juvenile steelhead emigrants

b. Estimate adult steelhead escapement

c. Estimate freshwater productivity (juvenile recruits per spawner)

d. Examine juvenile steelhead rearing distribution and habitat use within the index watersheds

2. Monitor juvenile steelhead density, survival, and growth in habitat treatment areas relative to control areas with no habitat treatments within upper and lower Potlatch River watersheds

3. Monitor change in habitat variables associated with restoration projects in the treatment and control tributaries within the upper and lower watershed study areas