Salmonid Restoration Federation (SRF) was formed in 1986 to help stream restoration practitioners advance the art and science of watershed restoration. Salmonid Restoration Federation promotes restoration, stewardship, and recovery of California native salmon, steelhead, and trout populations through education, collaboration, and watershed capacity building. Our goals are to restore and recover California salmonids, improve water quality in California watersheds, and enhance watershed restoration efforts in California.
SRF is based in Humboldt County and we have been actively engaged in low flow monitoring, planning, and water conservation outreach in the Redwood Creek tributaries of the South Fork Eel River for over five years including providing technical education and assistance, conducting targeted education and outreach, low flow monitoring, and producing a feasibility study and target flow memo with the proposed project team.
SRF is uniquely qualified to perform the proposed work based on our successful history of providing technical education and planning within the proposed watershed. SRF has developed strong working relationships with landowners, stakeholders, and the regulatory agencies focused on this important watershed.
Stillwater Sciences will support SRF as the technical lead for most aspects of this project. Stillwater is a full-service environmental consulting company specializing in restoration design, hydrology, geomorphology, fisheries, wildlife biology; water quality; and regulatory compliance. Our scientists and engineers have extensive knowledge of local wildlife and hydrologic/geomorphic processes and use this breadth of experience to develop restoration projects that are truly multi-benefit. Stillwater routinely works with multi-stakeholder teams to implement complex scientific studies, develop engineered designs, and comply with regulatory guidelines. Stillwater’s projects related to flow enhancement include:
- Redwood Creek Flow Enhancement. In partnership with SRF and TU, Stillwater completed flow enhancement planning in a small portion of Redwood Creek adjacent to the town of Briceland. The final Feasibility Study Report included a discussion of hydrology and target flows, prioritized treatment recommendations, and conceptual designs for several high priority projects. More recently, Stillwater Sciences has begun work as the technical lead on two additional flow enhancement projects in Redwood Creek: 1) Flow enhancement designs on the Marshall Ranch for a 15.5 million gallon off-stream pond, and 2) Flow enhancement planning throughout Redwood Creek.
- Mattole Headwaters Flow Enhancement. In partnership with Sanctuary Forest, Stillwater completed 100% designs for multiple groundwater recharge ponds with a total capacity of approximately 2 million gallons with the objective of enhancing dry season flows in Baker Creek and Mattole River mainstem. Work in Baker Creek is ongoing as the team assess the best approach for improving project functionality. Additional work in the Mattole headwaters region includes multiple design and permitting projects in the Lost River, Thompson Creek and McKee Creek sub-shed where Stillwater is the technical lead for multiple flow enhancement projects. Stillwater has provided services including: engineering design, hydrology and hydraulic analyses, permitting and CEQA support, biological assessments, and geomorphic assessments.
- Regional Instream Flow Assessment, San Luis Obispo County. Stillwater developed a targeted approach to estimate site-specific flow requirements for steelhead in San Luis Obispo County to improve the assessment of environmental water demand used by the County in their Master Water Plan. Available hydrology, instream flow analysis, and physical terrain data were analyzed to explore appropriate watershed stratification, and to assess the ability to extrapolate existing instream flow analysis to County watersheds. A rapid field assessment was also conducted in numerous steelhead-bearing watersheds throughout the County to estimate the minimum flows needed to support steelhead rearing during the sensitive spring and summer rearing periods.
- SF Eel River TMDL development support. Stillwater used a regional watershed analysis approach to develop the technical information that provided the EPA with a basis for setting “Total Maximum Daily Load” (TMDL) allocations for the 690 mi2 river basin. Stillwater’s work led to the development of the first TMDL to specify temperature ranges for a river basin listed in California. The main elements of Stillwater’s work included: (1) developing numeric targets for sediment based on indicators of habitat quality for spawning, summer rearing and winter rearing; (2) analyzing sources of sediment using a rapid sediment budget approach that utilized a GIS/DTM to stratify the watershed coupled with intensive field investigation of sediment sources in selected sub-basins; and (3) assessing and modeling temperature using a temperature data set from ~75 recording thermographs, together with a heat loading model that made use of DTM and LANDSAT imagery to calculate riparian and topographic shading, low-flow discharge and channel width. The model was field-calibrated and verified using measurements of canopy shading and measurements relating low-flow discharge to hydraulic geometry.
Key Stillwater Sciences staff working on this project include:
Joel Monschke (M.S., Geotechnical Engineering) is a California licensed Civil Engineer (#C79688) with expertise in restoration engineering, hydrology and hydraulics, engineering geology, and geotechnical engineering, and geomorphology. He has been engaged in a host of water resource management and restoration activities throughout California, including six years as Director of the Good Roads Clear Creeks Program at the Mattole Restoration Council, and two years as a Restoration Engineer at Questa Engineering. Mr. Monschke has directed and developed projects that upgrade public access infrastructure and enhance fisheries and aquatic habitat. He has focused on the planning, design and implementation of complex projects, including flood control, fish habitat and riparian restoration, hydrologic planning, groundwater recharge, landslide stabilization, and restoration effectiveness analyses.
Jay Stallman (M.S., Geology) has nearly 20 years’ experience developing, implementing, and managing projects related to identifying and controlling sediment sources, analyzing channel sediment transport and storage, sediment budgeting at watershed to reach scales, and incorporating information about physical processes into aquatic and riparian habitat restoration and management. Mr. Stallman’s experience stems from interdisciplinary problem solving in mountainous and lowland settings throughout California and the Pacific Northwest. In recent notable projects, Mr. Stallman was lead geomorphologist in creating a framework for enhancing coho salmon habitat in the lower Ten Mile River in Mendocino County, developing a recovery assessment and implementation framework to alleviate sediment impairments and improve ecosystem function in the Elk River tributary to Humboldt Bay, and planning for large-scale floodplain habitat restoration along the Salmon River in western Siskiyou County. Mr. Stallman is a California Professional Geologist (#8911) and Oregon Registered Geologist (#G2344).
Tom Hicks, Attorney at Law is a California water law, real property, and conservation attorney who represents a variety of public interest organizations, landowners, and others on select public policy, transactional, administrative, regulatory, and litigation matters. He works across California on multiple WCB projects that enhance streamflow as well as large-scale conservation easements to protect watershed conservation values in perpetuity.
Hicks Law Relevant Project Examples include:
- 2019 Wildlife Conservation Board (WCB) Prop One: Sproul Creek, South Fork Eel River, Flow Enhancement Planning
- 2019 WCB Prop 1: USFS Hot Springs-Montecito Creek - Section 1707 Project
- 2019 WCB Prop 1: Ventura Watershed Flow Enhancement and Water Resiliency
- 2018 WCB: Marshall Ranch Flow Enhancement Design (Redwood Creek)
- 2018 WCB Lower Battle Creek Scoping Study
- 2018 WCB Santa Rosa Creek Flow Enhancement Pilot Project
- 2018 WCB San Luis Obispo Creek Flow Enhancement
- 2017 WCB Integrated Water Strategies to Enhance Flows in Santa Barbara and Ventura Counties
David Sanchez, Marshall Ranch Property Manager has been involved in all aspects of the sale of the 10.5-million-dollar conservation easement on behalf of the Marshall Ranch to the California Rangeland Trust. This easement is funded by the California Department of Fish and Wildlife, the Department of Conservation, and California Department of Forestry and Fire Protection. Mr. Sanchez’ responsibilities included managing all levels of general ranch operations including timber harvest, education, and operations. In addition to general ranch projects, David has also managed a wide variety of agency-funded projects such as:
- Development of multiple Spring/Storage Tank and cattle trough placements; Farm Services Agency (FSA)
- Restoration of several miles of ranch roads to limit sedimentation flow into critical anadromous streams; The Natural Resources Conservation Services (NRCS)
- 2015 Marshall Ranch Action Plan for Coho Recovery in the South Fork Eel River; The California Department of Fish and Wildlife (CDFW) in conjunction with the Eel River Watershed Improvement Group (ERWIG) and Pacific Watersheds and Associates (PWA)
- Installation of exclusionary stock fencing to limit access to critical anadromous streams; The Natural Resources Conservation Services (NRCS)
- Restoring 27 acres of Oak Woodlands to its historic 80 acres through an Oak Woodland Restoration Project: The Natural Resources Conservation Services (NRCS)
- Sudden Oak Death Syndrome mitigation; The Natural Resources Conservation Services (NRCS)
- Restocking Redwood; The Natural Resources Conservation Services (NRCS)
Eli Asarian is principal at Riverbend Sciences with expertise in aquatic ecology, water quality, hydrology, data management and analysis, geographic information systems, and historical ecology. He has 20 years of experience working on California and Oregon watersheds. He specializes in statistical analysis of large, complex datasets compiled from many sources and has authored or co-authored over 25 technical analyses on streamflow, stream temperature, water quality, and algae in the Klamath and Eel River watersheds, including three peer-reviewed journal articles. He has also assisted National Marine Fisheries Service in developing and implementing recovery plans for salmon and steelhead throughout California, including the South Fork Eel River. In recent years he completed stream temperature compilation and analysis projects in the Klamath, Salmon, South Fork Trinity, and Eel rivers, and is currently working on additional temperature projects in the South Fork Eel and Trinity rivers. He serves on the Salmonid Restoration Federation’s board of directors. His curriculum vitae is available online at: http://www.riverbendsci.com/cv.