Completion Form

2019

The Colorado River Restoration 2.0 project coordinators successfully implemented work across property boundaries and amongst agencies. Coordination took many forms including planning meetings, as well as on the ground touring of sites with contract crews, interagency work, and final assessments of sites.

On the ground methods were primarily:
*	Hand removal and herbicide treatment to clear tamarisk from important native plants including willow and cottonwood
*	Hand removal and herbicide treatment to clear tamarisk from side channels to open them to high water scouring flows. 
*	Spraying knapweed and other high priority exotics along the river corridor focusing first at high traffic sites that can be a vector for seed transportation
*	Mapping and removing Ravenna grass, a newly emerging invasive exotic that has shown explosive growth in this area lately

RRR: 
Coordination
Rim to Rim Restoration successfully facilitated and supervised many projects this season working across property boundaries and between different agencies. There has also been continued progress about effectively creating and communicating project procedures to contract crews on the ground, especially when there is limited contact with those crews.

Castle Valley Riparian Plan 
The Castle Valley Riparian plan was drafted in June and two meetings were held with the Castle Valley water committee on this topic. The plan is to be finalized soon including input gathered from Castle Valley residents through surveys and input from the water committee.  The plan shows that most of the private portions of Castle Creek's riparian areas have already implemented cut stump methods to remove Russian olives and encourage native plant growth.  The Town of Castle Valley will not use herbicides on its portions of Castle Creek, which resulted in that section of creek being removed from this project.  The plan also shows that the Town section of creek is very overgrown with native and non native plants -- and that a great deal can be done to improve the health and safety of this reach of creek without the use of herbicides.

Site Evaluations 
54 Sites were evaluated using a presence absence form developed by RRR, BLM, and FFSL. Sites included all early BLM tamarisk removal sites from the Dolores river confluence to the potash boat ramp. Part of data collected includes a basic scoring of sites of their diversity and amount of native plants. Data collected on possible follow-up work per site has been put into an excel sheet to be used for contract crews if they finish work early. This process has helped us find exotic invasives along the river corridor that we were unaware of and that will get treated in future years.  In 2020, with the assistance of BLM funding additional sites will be assessed along the river corridor and these assessments will be used to better plan future work.  All these assessments as well as data outlining initial and follow up treatments at this site is being assembled in a database that will be accessible to all collaborators.

FFSL: 
As part of its contribution to the Colorado River Cross-Watershed Phase II collaboration; FFSL worked with Grand County Noxious Weeds to identify and treat secondary herbaceous weeds through spot applications of herbicide within tamarisk removal sites previously established through work done in Phase I. Each polygon was visited periodically throughout the year using Grand Counties specialized herbicide tank raft. Spot applications were able to be completed at a much higher rate than if workers had been dependent on backpacks alone.
In areas where public presence or interest precludes the use of chemicals, mechanical treatment using handheld brush mowers was used.

TNC Matheson Preserve: 
The purpose of this project was to remove 34 acres of Russian knapweed, Hoary Crest, Perennial Pepperweed in 25 locations within the Matheson Wetlands Preserve in an effort to reduce these non-native herbaceous weeds and keep them from spreading. A four-person crew was hired through Utah Conservation Corps.  The crew applied a mixture of Milestone and Escort. Work was completed and inspected in May 2019.

Plateau Restoration Inc. Jackson Bottom:
Restoration work continued at Jackson Bottom site with weed removal, clearing wildlife routes, chain-sawing live tamarisk, willow pole planting, seeding, and transplanting native grasses.  In addition, plugs of grass plugs were collected and planted into about 150 1-gallon pots for staging and later planting.  Work was done during 22 site visits conducted throughout the year.

Sites still lacking in native vegetation were selected for transplanting of Saltgrass and Alkali Sacaton collected from healthy stands in the site, and planting of rabbitbrush and sage in xeric areas.  Planting was done with volunteers in November and again in March.  Most transplants were watered again in May and in June.

Volunteers also assisted with removing fallen Tamarisk from clearings where native vegetation had become established, in order to keep access routes open through the Tamarisk and to the river.  Both paid and trainee Youth Corps crews chain-sawed tamarisk from near the bank and widened wildlife routes in tamarisk thickets, applying Pathfinder II herbicide to cut stumps.  Native seed mix was hand scattered into about 1 acre of newly accessible areas from this clearing.  A total of 41 volunteers together contributed 666 hours to this project in FY 2019.

PRI staff identified areas of Russian Knapweed and Perennial Pepperweed and coordinated with Grand County Weed Department to apply herbicide to these patches in early April, 2019.

The total proposed area for this project was 661 acres. 6 projects weren't executed, totaling 342 acres, leaving 318 proposed acres.   310  of those acres were implemented associated with this project. In addition, 32 russian olive and 11 elms were treated in the 46 river miles from Dewey Bridge to Jacksons Bottom.  54 legacy tamarisk and Russian olive removal sites were monitored using a presence absence form developed by RRR, FFSL, and BLM to evaluate project successes. Sites dropped from the proposal due to bidding being higher than budgets include: Westwater Canyon, Fish Ford, Castle Valley Town Property, Matheson Burn, Gold Bar Campground and Williams Bottom.

RRR:
Coordination
Coordination has been fine-tuned over the course of Colorado River Restoration 1 (WRI 4009) and this project. A challenge with this project was splitting out the money by agency. It delayed contracts being released. This has been changed for the 3.0 budgeting.  Other coordination improvements being implemented in Colorado River 3.0 include more active oversite and overall project orientation and training by RRR with youth corps crews at the start of the project

Site evaluations
Site evaluations were completed over 54 different sites. It helped us with early detection of important invasive species such as Russian olive, Canada thistle, and Ravenna grass. It also helped give us a quantifiable score of the number of natives on site and the number of invasives. Most importantly we were able to take overview photos at all sites so that in the future repeat photos can be taken to compare.

UCC: 
Below is a list of lessons learned/important project considerations moving forward from UCC crew leaders.

Colorado 2.0 BLM camp knapweed treatment:
Crews working in campgrounds got a lot of questions from the public about herbicide use that was already on posted signs so simplifying signs without sacrificing necessary detail is important. 
   
Castle Creek Retreatment
Communication between the sawyer and herbicide applicator is really important in effective woody invasive treatment. The sawyer needs to slow down and communicate directly with the applicator so nothing is missed.

New Rapid
Good: A large section of tamarisk was removed in one of the densest areas on the polygon, this created open space around natives and making a large visual impact. 
Bad: Starting in the densest areas made it harder to find places to put all of the biomass. 
Learned: This year work at this site will begin in the less dense areas to make room for biomass piles and then work into the denser areas. Also, when working with a large number of crews on a small site, it would be more effective to assign individual crews to different areas to avoid creating a chaotic worksite and compounding the effects of less motivated members. However, when using this strategy, it is extremely important that all leaders make time to communicate at the end of the day to assure that overarching project goals are being met and that work is consistent.
 
Salt Wash
While we were able to use the wash as a location to store biomass in hopes that it would be naturally removed during highwater, there was not enough space to fit the amount of biomass that was slated to be removed without worrying about clogging the channel. It would be helpful to be able to create piles along the mainstem of the river.
 
Kane Creek
In instances where multiple crews are scheduled to work on one project over different time frames, it would have been helpful to have a crew leader stay out and overlap with the next crew to ensure consistency. Also, in instances where burn piles are being utilized for biomass control, it is helpful to receive direct input from the entities that will be doing the burning.

FFSL:
Secondary herbaceous weeds are a consistent and predictable complication of tamarisk removal efforts along the Colorado River. Following an initial entry within the project focus area, it should be expected that Russian knapweed, Canada thistle, and Perennial pepperweed will become established unless follow-up treatments are completed. To that end, FFSL and Grand County consistently treat previously cut sites to decrease competition from exotics.

TNC:
Coordination with Utah State University went smoothly and UCC did a great job with the execution of the work.  Jake Deslauriers, project manager for UCC, ensured the terms of the contract were satisfactorily met. One challenge associated with this project was in locating invasion sites.  The project area is approximately 900 acres with limited access in certain areas so it was necessary for the crews to spend time in advance of treatment to locate these sites.
Another challenge for a project involving weed treatment is the timing for optimal effectiveness of the treatment.  It was recommended that the work take place in late spring rather than late fall as originally planned due to the nature of the target weeds.  The delay of completion did not cause any issues, and it was a good lesson learned for me as a preserve manager to better understand the ecology of weeds and weed treatment.

Plateau Restoration Inc.:
Tamarisk removal and restoration have been conducted on 67 acres at Jackson Bottom since 2010 by PRI and Grand County, Utah DNR, and USFWS partners.  PRI uses college students as volunteers for much of the labor.  This private land near the Potash mine has been set aside as valuable wildlife habitat and is ideal for experimentation and training of future resource managers in SW riparian restoration.

Most of the original tamarisk was bull-hogged in 2010.  Clearings in remaining Tamarisk were later bull-hogged or chain-sawed to create wildlife routes to the river and sheltered areas for establishment of native vegetation.  Seeding with saltgrass, alkali sacaton, saltbush and beeplant, has had good results especially within clearings in the Tamarisk.  Plantings using Tamarisk to provide shade from the SW have been remarkably successful and now that grass stands are established, we've had success transplanting native grasses within the site.  Cottonwoods planted in the lower end of the site had become established but were topped by beavers this spring above the protective wire, although re-sprouting has occurred.  Native Sueada in the upper end has shown significant regeneration following die-off in the drought of 2018. Russian Knapweed and Perennial Pepperweed persist in the site and appear to be spreading.

River flows were the highest since 2011, just above 2014 levels, and in late June about half of the mid-section of the site was still under water.

The work on Colorado River 1.0 and 2.0 has built strong collaborative relations between land managers at the local BLM Field Office, NPS office, the local FFSL Sovereign Lands office, the County and non profit land managers.  With the many administrative boundaries in our area the continued communication through the SE Utah Riparian Partnership is creating continuity across these boundaries and across intra agency boundaries as well.

RRR:
Coordination:
RRR coordination efforts will continue through Colorado River Restoration 3.0 as well as through the SE Utah Riparian Partnership.  Colorado River 3.0 projects begin next month at multiple sites and the legacy site assessments will help refine future planning efforts.

Castle Valley Riparian Plan
The Castle Valley Riparian Plan includes project suggestions to improve the riparian corridor in Castle Valley. Projects will eventually be taken from the report and implemented.

Site Evaluations:
Site evaluations along Mill and Pack Creek have begun and will be completed over the next few months. Sites may be added along river corridor as well as more tamarisk and olive removal happens.

FFSL: 
Through continued monitoring of restoration sites, FFSL will be able to make a determination of areas where the need for active revegetation is greatest. Such sites will be candidates for seeding or planting depending on specific site conditions. In areas which appear to have a native species which are self-propagation, emphasis will remain on subduing exotic competition.

Matheson: 
The TNC and DNR plan to continue active management of the preserve to improve fisheries habitat, and bird habitat.

Plateau Restoration Inc.:
PRI has an agreement with landowner, Intrepid Potash to work on this site through 2026.  Noxious weed control will be managed by Grand County Weed Department and Utah FFSL.  The land owner has pledged to leave the property undeveloped and has offered to rip the road in the center of the property when it is no longer needed for the project.

Gabriel Bissonette

09/10/2019 14:35:41