Columbia Basin Water Transactions Program

Water Transaction Increases Flows by up to 200%

“My goal is to see that the practices of good land management will outlive us and have an enduring presence.”
– Kevin Campbell, Rancher

Rancher Kevin Campbell describes his place this way: "It's steep and rocky, and like the rest of Eastern Oregon, it doesn't have enough water most of the year." Since 1905, Kevin's family has been raising cattle in the John Day Basin near the towns of Lonerock and Monument. During the peak of the agricultural season, between July and September, the area sees less than two inches of rain, not nearly enough to produce a crop of alfalfa.

Here, at Campbell Crossing, the family manages 300 acres of irrigated ground that were fed until 2010 by a diversion on Rudio Creek, the first tributary salmon find on their way up the warmer—by two to three degrees—North Fork of the John Day River. A water right has allowed the Campbells to sustain the ranch, but at the cost of drying up the lower two miles of the creek during the summer, thereby closing off access to about 16 miles of high-value salmon habitat.

The John Day River hosts one of the best runs of wild Chinook salmon in the Columbia Basin. And Rudio Creek, despite its small size, has the potential to play a large role in raising their productivity. Its cool, spring-fed waters attract spawning steelhead and, most crucially, offer sanctuary both for migrating adult salmon moving up the North Fork and for juveniles moving down. Biological harbors like Rudio Creek are in short supply all across the Columbia Basin.

When Kevin Campbell was approached by staff of The Freshwater Trust (TFT) in 2007 to explore an alternative, he was ready to talk. "My goal," says Kevin, "is to see that the practices of good land management will outlive us and have an enduring presence."

With support from the Columbia Basin Water Transactions Program, TFT worked with the Campbells to move their diversion from the creek to the North Fork, where flows are less limiting. Additional partners helped to fund major improvements to the irrigation system, along with seven miles of fencing to keep cattle away from stream banks.

In 2010, Rudio Creek ran all summer long—the new status quo—and the ranch's alfalfa crop was up by 25 percent. Kevin expects water efficiencies to double his crop in three years. But he also sees a larger ripple effect to the project. "We've put together a Rudio Creek Working Group with seven neighboring landowners and multiple agencies," Kevin reports, in an effort to extend their success and build on economies of scale.

"On Rudio Creek, the diversity of partners and the relationships built by working together have seeded a series of outcomes that go well beyond a single property," says Ken Bierly, deputy director of the Oregon Watershed Enhancement Board, a restorationpartner. "The momentum of the project has produced a coalition of landowners who are now exploring what can be achieved to improve habitat conditions throughout the basin. This is the future of conservation."

Year-Round Flows for the First Time in a Century

“Monitoring helped develop trust.”
– Tex Marsolek, Manager, Tin Cup County Water and Sewer District

Don't be fooled by his first name. Tex Marsolek was born on the Montana side of the Bitterroot Range and grew up with a fishing pole in his hand. "I can remember fishing Tin Cup Creek in the ‘40s; it was nothing to catch 15-inch cutthroats—but not anymore," he says. "We had to do something to bring it back. And this is it. This is the biggie."

Tex is assistant manager of the Tin Cup County Water and Sewer District, near the town of Darby. For years, he and the staff of the Clark Fork Coalition (CFC) turned themselves to a seemingly quixotic task along a contentious tributary. Their aim was to better manage flows in a stream overdrawn for irrigation and stock water since the late 19th century. "We did a lot of head scratching to figure this out," Tex says.

Tin Cup Creek runs 15 miles from its headwaters to its confluence with the Bitterroot River, a robust fishery and tributary of the 22,000-square-mile Clark Fork Basin, now undergoing a top-to-bottom restoration. With support from the Columbia Basin Water Transactions Program, CFC has managed a lease on Tin Cup's most senior water right since 2005, reestablishing year-round flows on a creek that biologists rank as high priority for the restoration of bull trout and other resident fish in the Columbia Basin. "Migratory cutthroat trout spawn here," says Chris Clancy, biologist with the Montana Department of Fish, Wildlife and Parks. "The more water there is in Tin Cup, the more young fish we'll have in the Bitterroot."

Initially, during the first years of the lease, tracking delivery of the water instream involved regular visits by CFC staff to take readings from newly installed flow gauges. Now, CFC also has monitoring help from local irrigators like Tex, who make sure landowners and fish get their fair share. Transparency has eased long-standing suspicions about upstream water users taking more than they should. "It's undisputable, good-quality data," Tex says. "In the past, a lot of folks really didn't understand the priority of water rights. Monitoring helped develop trust and got the griping resolved. Now, when the creek drops, I let people know when they'll have to turn off their water, and they don't argue anymore."

The years spent problem-solving together led the District and CFC to their biggest deal: in 2010, CBWTP funding provided the opportunity for the Coalition to purchase a 99-year lease for 400 acre-feet of water delivered annually in August and September, the period of lowest flows. This transaction allows the District to complete repairs to their century-old dam at the creek's headwaters, doubling the capacity of Tin Cup Lake by restoring it to its original size. With a larger volume in the reservoir, Tex can deliver streamflows and restore irrigation allotments to their historic levels—all without raising assessments to District members.

"When we started working on Tin Cup 4 years ago, it looked like we had jumped into a 100-year water war," says CFC's legal director, Barbara Hall. "There were days when we wondered if this was a place for investing limited resources to increase flows. Well, thanks to the Tin Cup County Water and Sewer District and the creek's landowners, it was."

Lease and Purchase Combination Creates Restoration Momentum

“It will benefit fish all the way to the mouth of the river. And it creates the critical mass to make smaller, incremental deals worthwhile.”
– Amanda Cronin, Project Manager, Washington Water Trust

Washington's largest tributary of the Walla Walla River noses up out of the Blue Mountains in the southeastern corner of the state. The branches and mainstem of the Touchet River run some 85 miles among postcard-pretty dunes left by ice-age glaciers and stocked with nutrients that produce rich crops of wheat.

Tu-se is a native word for "roasting." According to traditional Nez Perce storytelling, coyote roasted salmon from the Touchet—once upon a time. But the river's habitat has long been compromised by seasonal water withdrawals that diminish flows and increase temperatures, impeding steelhead and bull trout migration, especially in drought years.

"When steelhead return, we tend to have fish stacking up in the lower portion because they physically cannot move up the river," says Glen Mendel, district fish biologist for the Washington Department of Fish and Wildlife. "And you truncate smolts trying to get out. It's been the case for decades, if not for a hundred years." Targeting flows during what Glen calls the "shoulder periods" of early spring and fall will make the most difference for the Touchet's distinct population of wild steelhead. And that's precisely what the Washington Water Trust (WWT) is doing.

WWT maintains three water leases on the river and, with help from the Columbia Basin Water Transactions Program in 2010, it completed a second water right purchase, the largest ever made in the Walla Walla Basin. "It was also the fastest permanent restoration deal we've ever done," says WWT project manager Amanda Cronin.

Lew and Jackie Talbot contacted Amanda after reading her editorial in the Walla Walla Union Bulletin about water transactions. The Talbots raise wheat on a 385-acre property near Prescott. "I'm getting to the point in my life where I'm tired of changing hand lines," says Lew. "And I thought if I could help the stream out and help the fish and make out okay financially, I might as well do it."

Most years, spring flows piled up so much gravel in the Talbot's section of the river that the irrigation diversion and fish screen would wash out and need tending, on top of the constant work of moving heavy irrigation pipe. When they paused to consider how selling water rights might improve their operation, the numbers added up. The Talbots have begun modifying their rotation to include some dryland farming, with lower yields offset by the extra time they now have and the capital to make new investments.

Lew and Jackie's efforts leave an additional 387 acre-feet of water in the Touchet River just when migrating fish are looking for it. "It will benefit fish all the way to the mouth of the river," Amanda says. "And it creates the critical mass to make smaller, incremental deals worthwhile." By protecting about 7 cubic feet per second of water instream during the driest times of the year, WWT's work amplifies the efforts of other partners, including the Walla Walla Conservation District, which has completed more than 35 miles of riparian restoration on the Touchet and a fish-friendly makeover of Hofer Dam. "We all cite one another's work," Amanda says. "It's all complementary." And it has established a new trajectory for the Touchet. In 2010, biologists saw the largest steelhead returns there in two decades.

BEFORE

New Flows Open the Door to 1,000 Miles of Habitat

“Number one, this makes financial sense—for any ranch, that would have to be the first cut.”
– Mark Olson, Landowner

AFTER

The farthest reach for adult Pacific salmon—their eastern limit—is at the end of a 900-mile swim through the Columbia and Snake Rivers to the expansive Upper Salmon Basin of central Idaho. From the fish's perspective, this big country, despite some 7,000 miles of streams and rivers, has long been a greatly diminished space constrained by human demands for water to support agriculture in a dry landscape.

When Lewis and Clark scouted this territory, they saw their first salmon on one of the region's fabled rivers, the Lemhi. In the 1960s, 3,000 redds were found in its gravels. By the 1990s, that number was down to dozens. One significant factor is an irrigation structure called the L6, located 7.5 miles above the confluence with the Salmon River and serving the area's most senior water rights. "In dry years, it dewaters the entire Lemhi," says Department of Fish and Game biologist Jeff Lutch. "Going back to the last quarter of the 19th century, it's the pinch point for passage," agrees Morgan Case, biologist with the Idaho Department of Water Resources (IDWR). The implications for fish are clear. "There's at least 1,000 miles of habitat above the L6," Lutch says, "including 31 main tributaries, and more that we don't even have names for."

The Lemhi is a haven for Chinook, steelhead, and bull trout, but until 2010 there was no certainty that fish could pass the L6 in either direction. With the help of the CBWTP's scientific and strategic review, and support from the BPA through the Idaho Fish Accord, the Lemhi now runs the distance even in dry years. To improve flows, IDWR purchased eight easements. "It's not only our first permanent deal," Case says, "it also gets us almost halfway to our goal of protecting passage here. And it keeps irrigators whole."

One easement comes from landowner Mark Olson, who works as district conservationist with the Natural Resources Conservation Service. "The water transaction keeps the ranch in the family, which is huge," he says. "And it allows us to make improvements on our irrigation." By replacing an open ditch with gated pipes, he will roughly double water efficiency and simplify his operation. "But number one, this makes financial sense—for any ranch, that would have to be the first cut," Mark says.

The comprehensive deal establishes a minimum flow of 25 to 35 cubic feet per second between mid-March and mid-November, and allows landowners to continue irrigating when more water is available. Biologists are intensively monitoring the effectiveness of the transaction. "We're using the latest technologies, including tags and radio transmitters, to follow fish through the Lemhi, so we can make adjustments where needed," Lutch says. The Lemhi is one of several pilot study areas where research support from BPA and the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration is improving the science of fisheries management throughout the Columbia Basin.

Meanwhile, Lutch observes that the new flows make it possible for other partners working in the Lemhi to deliver on a long list of ambitious restoration efforts. "There are tens of millions of dollars being put into land conservation, barrier removals, and riparian and channel improvements," he says. "What's the point in making these investments if you can't get the fish in at L6?"