To the editor:
A juvenile coho salmon leapt out of the water in front of us just minutes after we finished removing a dike upstream from Toledo – the first wild fish to ride the afternoon tide to the marsh we were restoring along the Yaquina River.
It was an incredible sight. Not often in the restoration world, do we get such immediate feedback that the work we’re doing makes a difference.
In addition to providing food and shelter to young coho, tidal marshes like this nurture juvenile Chinook salmon, Dungeness crab, English sole, pacific herring, shiner perch, starry flounder, and steelhead. These species and many others that utilize these rich nursery areas are integral to Oregon’s commercial and recreational fishing economies as well as the birds and other wildlife that draw many thousands of visitors to our coast.
There were several other benefits to this project conducted by the Newport-based MidCoast Watersheds Council. Removing nearly 1,700 feet of old dike allowed brackish water to return to this 55-acre abandoned pasture, killing invasive plant species that took over in the absence of salty flows and clearing the way for native grasses, sedges and reeds to flourish again.
These salt-tolerant plants, along with the Sitka spruce planted on slightly higher ground, are capturing and storing carbon in their deep roots and stems, sheltering fish and wildlife and helping slow the effects of climate change. It’s part of their natural lifecycle. We simply needed to give this tidal marsh the opportunity to heal itself.
With the recent passage of HB 3409, the Oregon Legislature and governor recognized the importance of applying restorative management principles to farms, forests and other natural and working lands to deal with climate change. It’s the sort of task that I and many thousands of people working and volunteering for the 100 watershed councils and soil and water conservation districts or working for fish and wildlife agencies and tribal governments have been doing for decades – whether it’s planting vegetation along streams or reconnecting rivers to floodplains, improving fish passage with bridges and larger culverts or installing fencing and livestock watering systems to protect river habitat and water quality. It also provides jobs for backhoe operators, engineers, biologists, nursery owners and tree planters among others.
And thanks to this new legislation, there’s a dedicated source of money to do more projects.
There are endless opportunities. As much as 70 percent of the state’s tidal marshes were lost to the same sort of dikes we removed along the Yaquina River in August 2020. Spruce swamps, one of the region’s most potent carbon sponges, used to occupy half of Oregon’s tidal wetlands. Now it’s only about 5 percent but protection and restoration opportunities remain.
Farms, forests, nurseries and communities will also benefit from the investments in long-term sustainable management that HB 3409 provides. For example, restored watersheds will have the capacity to capture and store more rainfall and snow melt, reducing downstream flood damage, easing future droughts and reducing wildfire risk.
We owe the Oregon Legislature and Gov. Tina Kotek our gratitude for enlisting some of our best natural allies in mitigating the threats posed by climate change. Our future – and the future of our fish, forests, farms and communities – depends on it.
- Fran Recht of Depoe Bay is the habitat program manager for the Pacific States Marine Fisheries Commission and is on the board of the MidCoast Watersheds Council.