This contract provides funding for Methow Salmon Recovery Foundation (MSRF) to do project planning, scoping, and design work in the Methow subbasin in the Upper Columbia.

Projects and tasks included:
1. Methow island assessment - This contract cycle will include an evaluation of the depositional island and bar features present in the Methow River. MSRF will manage a study to assess the formation, persistence, and characteristics of these features and the physical and ecological factors that support them. This study will provide insight and understanding into the geomorphologic and riparian processes occurring with these features, and provide the information required to prioritize future habitat restoration projects that incorporate the ecological processes of riverine islands and bars into their conceptual designs. Final deliverable will be the completed assessment that includes a prioritized habitat project list. Work will be completed by MSRF staff and subcontractor(s).

2. Methow demonstration project planning and implementation – Activities include the following: MSRF staff will support BPA engineer in the develop of project designs for the Methow Demonstration Project and oversee implementation near RM 43 on the Methow River. The Methow Demonstration Project aims to develop designs that increase bar roughness to support riparian vegetation community development on seasonally inundated bars and islands. Vegetated bars and seasonally inundated islands support aquatic food webs and provide critical rearing habitat during spring high flow periods when suitable habitat is generally lacking. This project aims to demonstrate a lower-cost, low-risk approach that promotes appropriate river processes, such as sediment sorting and retention, that build and maintain high quality rearing habitat.  

3. Corner Pocket project planning – The Corner Pocket project is a reach-scale, process-based restoration project under development in the lower Chewuch River. Activities include the following: MSRF staff will work with project partners including BPA, Bureau of Reclamation, USFWS, WDFW, and selected design engineer (funded by Reclamation) to develop project conceptual designs and begin work on 30% designs.

4. WDFW fish screen projects support - Bear Creek test well and review Beaver Creek diversions – During this contract cycle, MSRF staff will support WDFW Fish Screen projects in Bear Creek and Beaver Creek. Activities include the following:

On Bear Creek, MSRF will manage the effort to evaluate the feasibility of moving the principal Bear Creek irrigation right from a surface diversion to a ground water well. This diversion, which serves the Bear Creek Golf Course, serves the largest single water right in the system and dewaters the creek when in use during low flows. MSRF will manage subcontracts with a well driller to drill 1-3 test wells to evaluate whether a groundwater source is a viable alternative to the surface diversion. MSRF will work with legal subcontractor to receive legal assistance on potential movements of points of diversion and/or consolidation of water rights within Bear Creek. Additional legal assistance may be needed to develop an easement across intervening lands for irrigation well and delivery system. Bear Creek is a closed basin, so opportunity to drill a well will require legal assistance to secure a start card based on public benefit.

In the Beaver Creek watershed, MSRF will work with WDFW to address the impacts of multiple irrigation diversions on instream habitat. The diversions are located on both Beaver Creek and Frazer Creek (a tributary to Beaver Creek), both fully adjudicated watersheds within the Methow Subbasin. MSRF and WDFW have identified diversions on both Beaver and Frazer Creeks that impair instream flows, passage, and habitat conditions within the Lower Beaver Creek reaches 4 and 5 and in the lowest reach of Frazer Creek. MSRF will work with WDFW to identify opportunities to improve two existing diversions and to transfer water rights to a third diversion where passage and screening issues have been previously addressed. Due to the adjudicated/closed basin status of both Beaver and Frazer Creeks, MSRF will manage a subcontract with a water rights attorney to provide legal assistance on potential movements of points of diversion and/or consolidation of water rights within the two watersheds.