Upper Beaver Creek Final Design and Restoration

The Upper Beaver Creek project was designed to restore fish passage, improve connectivity to off-channel and floodplain habitat, and improve flood capacity in Beaver Creek between river miles 6.2-6.7. The project spanned 0.5 mile of in-stream habitat on private lands located to the west of the county road between Balky Hill and WDFW lands. The project reach includes two irrigation diversions (Batie and Marracci). The Project replaced a failed diversion log at the Batie Diversion that was creating a passage barrier with a low gradient broad crested constructed riffle to provide both fish passage and meet irrigation diversion needs. The upgrade completed at the Batie was based off of the previously successful renovation of the Marracci Diversion under separate grant funding. In addition, the project replaced an undersized culvert under the county road to connect a 1300-ft-long groundwater-fed wetland channel isolated by construction of the road. Together these actions restored both lateral and longitudinal fish passage through the site while improving habitat resilience, connectivity, and floodplain function.

Beaver Creek provides habitat for steelhead and spring Chinook and is ranked as a top-tier priority for restoration of both species. Addressing fish passage and channel stability at the irrigation diversions provided access to 17+ miles of upstream habitat, including the 2-mile-long Beaver Creek Habitat project completed by the Yakama Nation in 2019.

The constructed riffle was designed as a broad crested roughened channel that fit within the range of stream gradients in the reach, so it was designed to function over a wide range of flow and sediment conditions. Habitat logs and boulders were incorporated into the constructed riffle to provide fish habitat within and increase roughness through the site. Replacing the undersized road culvert allowed fish ingress and egress to the existing 1.5 acres of groundwater-fed off-channel wetland habitat on the east side of the county road, provide refuge and rearing habitat for juvenile steelhead. The project work was designed to increase flood capacity and floodplain connectivity throughout the site, to ensure resilience to increased frequencies of extreme flows and sediment transport resulting from watershed scale wildfires.

The goal of the UBC project is to increase habitat resilience in the aftermath of catastrophic change resulting from wildfire and flooding impacts. The purpose is improve fish passage at irrigation structures, to expand habitat complexity, to expand floodplain connectivity, and enhance access to off channel cold water refuge areas. This benefits primarily ESA-listed steelhead and Chinook.