John Day Basin Partnership Project Tracker
Welcome to The John Day Basin Partnership Project Tracker!
The John Day Basin Partnership’s unifying purpose is to bring together stakeholders from across the basin with the common interest of restoring and maintaining our watersheds to maximize their ecological, economic, social, and cultural benefits. We apply deep knowledge of the basin, best available science, and cooperative planning and fundraising to empower more actions that establish healthy and resilient native habitats, working landscapes, and local communities for future generations.
The eight guiding principles for execution of the vision and purpose are:
- Local leadership. The knowledge and commitment of local people is essential to achieving healthy and resilient native habitats and working landscapes.
- Collaboration. Decision-making must integrate management goals of both private and public lands.
- Fundraising. Joint planning and fundraising at the basin-scale can help deliver the long-term funding necessary to achieve outcomes.
- Science. The best available science and technology will be applied to all decisions and actions.
- Voluntary Efforts. Proactive, voluntary restoration is preferable to mandated or emergency action.
- Ecological and Socioeconomic Balance. The needs of the natural environment must be balanced with the economic, social, and cultural needs of rural communities.
- Scale. A holistic “ridge-to-ridge” approach to restoration is vital to meeting the long-term needs at the landscape scale.
- Adaptive management. Persistent monitoring and adaptation is essential to realizing lasting change.
Featured Projects
Area to be thinned of lodgepole
| Project Type | Restoration of Aquatic Native Fish Habitat |
|---|---|
| Lead Implementer | North Fork John Day Watershed Council |
| Other Organizations | U.S. Forest Service - Malheur Management Unit |
| Stage | Implementation |
| Duration | 2020 - 2022 |
The MFJDR IMW Final Summary Report demonstrated that high water temperatures are the most important habitat limiting factor in ESA listed Mid-C summer steelhead and spring Chinook salmon productivity in the MFJDR, perennial tributaries are the primary contributors for cool water. Camp Creek provides important rearing habitat for juvenile steelhead and Chinook salmon as well as spawning habitat for steelhead. This planting and fencing project on Camp Creek will bolster the cold water refugia potential of Camp Creek by increasing streambank shading and plant density in thermally sensitive areas.
Incision on Hidaway Creek
| Project Type | Restoration of Aquatic Native Fish Habitat |
|---|---|
| Lead Implementer | North Fork John Day Watershed Council |
| Other Organizations | |
| Stage | Planning/Design |
| Duration | 2021 - 2023 |
The Hidaway Creek instream project site encompasses 17.5 acres of floodplain and stream channel habitat on private land along 1.8 miles of lower Hidaway Creek east of Ukiah, Oregon in Umatilla County. Current habitat conditions limit the presence and productivity of native species of interest including ESA listed Mid-C summer steelhead and bull trout, spring Chinook salmon, Pacific Lamprey, and mussels. The primary purpose of this effort is to increase stream channel and floodplain complexity in a reach heavily influenced by past timber harvest and cattle grazing. This will be achieved through the addition of unanchored large wood and native plantings to the stream and floodplain.
Native Mid-C summer steelhead
| Project Type | Monitoring Aquatic Native Fish Habitat |
|---|---|
| Lead Implementer | North Fork John Day Watershed Council |
| Other Organizations | U.S. Forest Service - Umatilla |
| Stage | Implementation |
| Duration | 2020 - 2022 |
Oregon Department of Fish and Wildlife (ODFW) will work in collaboration with the Confederated Tribes of Umatilla and the U.S. Forest Service to monitor the productivity of both spring Chinook and Mid-C summer steelhead in Desolation Creek following habitat restoration. Fish monitoring will estimate the abundance and distribution of spawning adults, and abundance and survival of out-migrating juveniles.
ODFW will be installing a screw trap on Desolation Creek.Temperature and flow data in the North Fork John Day River are collected by multiple agencies and the NFJDWC will consolidate this data and supplement it by adding 18 temperature monitoring locations and 2 discharge...
ODFW will be installing a screw trap on Desolation Creek.Temperature and flow data in the North Fork John Day River are collected by multiple agencies and the NFJDWC will consolidate this data and supplement it by adding 18 temperature monitoring locations and 2 discharge...
| Project Type | Technical Assistance |
|---|---|
| Lead Implementer | North Fork John Day Watershed Council |
| Other Organizations | Oregon Department of Geology and Mineral Industries, South Fork John Day Watershed Council, United States Geological Survey |
| Stage | Planning/Design |
| Duration | 2020 - 2021 |
This project proposed the acquisition of high quality LiDAR in the Upper Middle Fork and Headwaters North Fork focal FIP geographies. High quality LiDAR will inform project planning, design, watershed modeling, and landscape scale monitoring. Restoration projects developed in the 3 FIP focal geographies aim to address the following limiting factors: reduced habitat connectivity, complexity, & flow regime function, degraded water quality, altered hydrology, reduced riparian condition and degraded riparian vegetative communities, altered sediment routing and overland flow, LWD recruitment, and impaired fish passage & habitat connectivity.
Comstock Basin - Thirtymile Creek
| Project Type | Restoration of Aquatic Native Fish Habitat |
|---|---|
| Lead Implementer | Gilliam County Soil and Water Conservation District |
| Other Organizations | Confederated Tribes Of Warm Springs, Oregon Watershed Enhancement Board, U.S. Natural Resources Conservation Service |
| Stage | Implementation |
| Duration | 2022 - 2023 |
The purpose of this project is to restore geomorphic, hydrologic
and biological process to approximately 5.7 miles of Thritymile Creek to improve habitat for the threatened Mid-Colombia River steelhead. Habitat impairments currently include:
• High surface water temperature
• Lack of channel complexity
• Ephemerally low and/or intermittent surface flow
and biological process to approximately 5.7 miles of Thritymile Creek to improve habitat for the threatened Mid-Colombia River steelhead. Habitat impairments currently include:
• High surface water temperature
• Lack of channel complexity
• Ephemerally low and/or intermittent surface flow
The Middle Fork John Day River was previously relocated to accommodate agriculture and the railroad.
| Project Type | Restoration of Aquatic Native Fish Habitat |
|---|---|
| Lead Implementer | Confederated Tribes Of Warm Springs |
| Other Organizations | |
| Stage | Implementation |
| Duration | 2020 - 2022 |
The Vinegar to Vincent Fish Habitat Improvement project is located on the Middle Fork John Day River (MFJDR). Prior land management activities and the installation of the railroad grade have resulted in a straightened and incised channel with limited floodplain interaction. Coupled with a degraded riparian corridor, temperatures have significantly increased throughout the basin, verging on the upper thermal tolerances of salmonids. This project will address these legacy effects through the addition of habitat complexity, extensive planting, and removal of the historic railroad grade, improving instream conditions for all native aquatic species.