Trout Creek Swamp proposal may restore wetlands

Beverly Bauges surveying the Trout Creek Swamp. She is a member of a GIS

special analysis team.

Like most of the stream basins in the Sisters area, Trout Creek has seen the tampering hand of man.

Forest Service officials say that Trout Creek Swamp is an old grazing site that has been tinkered with since at least the 1930s. At the time, the land was used for grazing and ditches were dug to drain the swamp in order to create drier pastureland for cattle. Alterations to Trout Creek's tributary system continued on into the 1970s.

Now, however, the Forest Service would like to see the area returned to its natural state. Mike Riehle, Fisheries Biologist for the Sisters Ranger District, is heading up a plan to restore the area.

"We're in the early stages of planning a meadow restoration project out there," Riehle said. "I'm excited about this because it's a sizable meadow project, and we haven't done many of those in this district."

Trout Creek, Riehle says, is aptly named and abounds with native redband (rainbow) trout.

The goal of the project, he said, "will be to mimic a natural system that retains water as well as those containing beaver dams. Such meadows hold water in the swamp longer in the summer and improve fish habitat."

The redband trout is a Forest Service-listed "sensitive species."

Riehle said that "the classification does not mean the fish are endangered, but they are a 'species of concern' that we want to keep closer tabs on so they won't become endangered."

Trout Creek originates from the snows of the North Sister, and a multitude of springs join it from the wetland area that is the subject of this study.

Riehle explained that the Trout Creek Swamp ditches were not built to irrigate the area.

Rather, the intent was the opposite, and the alterations feature deep cuts through the wetlands that strip groundwater off the land.

"Our proposal," Riehle said, "is to fill in those ditches and restore the natural wetlands."

Natural meandering stream channels are still visible in the area, and the Forest Service wants to put the water back where it belongs.

When water saturates a meadow, the moisture is retained in the system and the riparian health of the region is enhanced by the natural water reservoir created in the soils.

As a result, the stream keeps flowing longer during dry spells and rebounds more quickly when water flow increases again.

Riehle said that, historically, beavers played an important role in the retention of water in the area's stream systems.

Beavers created dams, ponds and diversions that retained water and soaked the soils of the stream basins.

The industrious rodents that gave The Beaver State its name, however, have been mostly trapped out.

Even in areas where the animals do not conflict with pasture use, they are often removed by landowners who don't like to see their aspen trees become beaver treats.

The Forest Service's plan for Trout Creek Swamp will be designed to duplicate the soil saturation achieved by beavers, and there's always the possibility that beavers might establish themselves in the area.

Another problem in the area is encroachment of lodgepole pine into the drying meadow.

Even as recently as the 1970s, aerial photographs showed that the meadow was mostly free of trees. But now there are 30-foot trees where once stood only grass.

"One of the proposals is to remove most of the lodgepoles encroaching into the meadow," Riehle said.

There is also some concern about reed canary grass, an exotic plant which tends to displace native wetland plants.

"It's a unique plant community that we're trying to revive, and it includes a number of interesting carnivorous plants," Riehle said.

Some of the swamp's more unusual flora include two species of sundew and two species of bladderwort.

Trout Creek normally peters out and flows underground before it reaches Sisters.

Technically, though, it's a tributary of Indian Ford Creek. The natural channel for Trout Creek actually passes north of the Forest Service compound in Sisters and behind the Sisters Industrial Park.

Every once in awhile, a wet year sends the creek right through town. The last time was five years ago when it flooded Camp Polk Road just beyond the airport.

Some of the channel in that area has since been better defined and a culvert installed to minimize future flooding.

Riehle stressed that the Forest Service wants the public to know that the restoration plan calls for only the ditches in the swamp area to be filled -- not the creek itself.

As part of the project process, the Forest Service is developing an Environmental Assessment (EA), a document in which the agency examines the potential impact of a proposal such as this.

"The EA will go out to give people an opportunity to express any concerns," Riehle said, "and the whole idea is to improve fish habitat."

He hopes that the EA will be available by early next year, giving the public further opportunity to comment on the proposal.