Completion Form

2020

Wetlands in Snake Valley serve as critical habitat for at least five of Utah's Species of Greatest Conservation Need, including four species threatened by groundwater withdrawal. UGS has developed a network of shallow wells to document baseline hydrologic conditions in these wetlands. Major accomplishments in FY2020 include:
1.	Obtained field measurements, downloaded pressure transducer data, and replaced 18 failing transducers from wells in Snake Valley and around Mona and Mills in October 2019 and April-May 2020.
2.	Processed data from all downloaded transducers by correcting for barometric pressure and drift.
3.	Sent 13 transducers for battery replacement and 9 transducers for data recovery and disposal to Solinst.
4.	Summarized status and trends for wetland wells, deeper wells, spring gages, and climate stations for the area as well as population trends for Least Chub and Columbia Spotted Frog. Some initial findings:
a.	No trend in climate data from 2000 to present when aggregated by water year; majority of climate stations showed increasing trend in minimum temperature from 2004 to present.
b.	Of the 55 wells with at least seven years of data, 23 each saw increasing or decreasing trends in water levels, with the remainder with no significant trend.
c.	Analyzing all hydrologic data together by wetland complex, Big Springs, Burbank Meadow, and Leland Harris saw significant declines in water levels over the past ten years, with declines ranging from -0.005 feet/year at Leland Harris to -0.096 feet/year at Burbank Meadows. Central Spring, Twin Spring, and South Gandy Salt Marsh had increasing trends of at least 0.017 feet/year over that time period.
d.	There were no trends in species parameters (egg mass and catch per unit effort) at sites with continuous data from 2009 to 2019. Least Chub catch per unit effort decline between 2007 and 2014 at Gandy and Bishop and Columbia Spotted Frog egg mass counts declined from 1997 to 2012 at Miller.
5.	Conducted literature review to determine habitat needs and sensitive life periods for sensitive Snake Valley species and recommended metrics that could be studied to better understand population fluctuations and sensitivity to water levels.
6.	Developed recommendations for additional studies that could be done to link hydrologic data to habitat and population dynamics for sensitive species
7.	Wrote report describing numbers 4-6, above, as well as recommendations for the future of the network (currently draft undergoing review).

All data collection and data processing are complete for this project. We have a draft of the ten-year report that is currently undergoing internal revision and will be complete before the Conservation Team meetings for Least Chub and Columbia Spotted Frog in December.

We estimate annual maintenance costs for this project at about $16,723, including $15,203 in direct costs and $1520 in indirect costs. Direct costs include vehicle rental and mileage, per diem, transducer repair and replacement, and personnel hours for field work, data processing, attending meetings, and project management, Costs are anticipated to rise loosely tied in inflation from cost of living raises and increases in per diem, vehicle expenses, and transducer costs. Funding for the Snake Valley work in FY21 was approximately 19% UGS, 23% BLM, and 58% Endangered Species Mitigation Fund. Each of these funders also contributed to maintenance of other wetland piezometer networks, which led to some small increases in efficiencies from shared activities. Field work in Tule Valley, funded entirely by the BLM, is particular valuable because it provides funding for a second trip to the region each season, which makes it less expensive for UGS to return to Snake Valley in the event that unforeseen circumstances prevent us from completing all downloads on the first trip to the area.

In addition to project maintenance funds, this project would benefit from additional funding to allow for more detailed analysis of hydrologic, habitat, and species data. Initial funding could be as low as $6000 per year to allow for preliminary analysis of the data, but would need to be substantial higher for more detailed studies.

Diane Menuz

08/31/2020 10:33:38