- Details
- By Tribal Business News Staff
- Energy | Environment
The Confederated Tribes of the Umatilla Indian Reservation (CTUIR) secured a $3.6 million grant from the National Fish and Wildlife Foundation to restore ancestral waters and protect traditional food sources through a comprehensive rehabilitation of the Birch Creek Watershed in Mission, Ore.
The tribes will reconnect splintered floodplains, build a new primary channel for the creek, and address flow issues with a new bridge. The restoration effort also includes decommissioning a 26-acre, large-scale industrial animal farm called a concentrated animal feeding operation, or CAFO. The initiatives aim to improve fish populations in the watershed and create more environmental resilience for the area.
A central focus of the project is strengthening populations of Endangered Species Act-listed steelhead and bull trout, Coho salmon, spring and fall Chinook salmon, Pacific lamprey and freshwater mussels, according to a statement. These species are vital to the tribes’ traditional food systems and hold significant cultural importance.
The project site lies upstream from the creek’s convergence with the Umatilla River on a 60.5-acre parcel, including half a mile of the creek itself. Located on private property, the site will be under a non-development and restoration easement on 943 acres, including water rights to be left instream in perpetuity among the landowner, Blue Mountain Land Trust and Bonneville Power Administration.
CTUIR will receive the funds this year and implement the project over several years, due to its complexity and CAFO decommissioning requirements by the state. The secondary high flow bridge is anticipated to be installed in this spring, followed by the CAFO decommissioning in 2026 and the floodplain restoration in 2027.
As a primary tributary for the Umatilla River, Birch Creek accounts for roughly half of the summer steelhead population in the area, according to CTUIR Department of Natural Resources Fisheries Biologist Rebecca Schwartz. The river’s fish populations and biodiversity are crucial to CTUIR’s subsistence programs — and their decline has subsequently set those programs back.
“The area has become entrenched and largely disconnected from the floodplain from past land use practices, and the lack of large wood and riparian vegetation has led to the loss of appropriate spawning and rearing habitat for salmonids,” Schwartz said in a statment. “Full floodplain connectivity will reduce summer stream temperatures, improve rearing conditions for juvenile steelhead and native species and improve the overall survivability for CTUIR First Foods.”
Jerimiah Bonifer, program manager for CTUIR’s fisheries, echoed the sentiment.
“This is a tremendous feat, not only in securing the significant amount of restoration funding, but also in ensuring the continuation of the UmaBirch Project that will continue to improve conditions for First Foods and community values related to the natural resources of the Umatilla Basin,” Bonifer said.
