NSEA Launches New Stream Stewards Program

Nooksack Salmon Enhancement Association (NSEA) is launching Stream Stewards, a pilot program to support five diverse watershed steward groups in Bellingham, Blaine and Ferndale. Pilot watersheds include Schell Creek in Ferndale, Terrell Creek, Squalicum Creek, Whatcom Creek, and Padden Creek.

These volunteer citizen groups will commit to adopting and restoring their streams. The program will provide the building blocks for an improved environment, new partnerships, and sustained healthy wild fish production. Through Stream Steward workshops, regular meetings, and accomplishment of on-the ground stream restoration projects, participants will cultivate the tools and knowledge to work together to protect and restore streams in our community.

A basic premise of watershed stewardship is that we must learn two things—that we live in a watershed, and that we understand how to live within it. NSEA proposes to teach specific methods of watershed protection and on-the-ground streamside restoration and give tools to community members to successfully apply resources to solve problems in these local watersheds. NSEA will use restoration of salmon habitat as the focus of all projects. Each participant will get a notebook about their watershed and will be encouraged to become involved in long-term stewardship of their stream.

This project addresses priority actions promoting fish and wildlife conservation and the habitats on which they depend. The five streams chosen for the pilot Stream Stewards project have been devegetated, channelized, and degraded by a century of agricultural, industrial and urban uses. Riparian areas are heavily infested with non-native and invasive plants. Fish passage is compromised in many cases due to culverts and poor riparian conditions.

Through this program, riparian habitat for rearing and spawning salmonids in five local streams will be improved by removing fish passage barriers and invasive species, increasing shade and plant diversity, restoring habitat for native wildlife, and providing large woody debris. Improving habitat for salmon also benefits other fish and wildlife species.

Washington State Department of Fish and Wildlife and the Whatcom Community Foundation have provided start-up funding for the Streams Stewards program. Other funding opportunities are being sought to expand the program to other sub-basins.

To learn more or to become involved in this program, please contact:

•Rachel Deryckx, NSEA Program Manager at 715-0283 or rderyckx@n-sea.org

•Bradford Lystra, Volunteer Coordinator at 715-0283 or brad@n-sea.org. §