Upper Clackamas Salmon Habitat and Side Channel Reconnection Project

In July of 2024, CRBC broke ground at the CTWS Side Channel Reconnection Project along the upper Clackamas River. The project took place along a stretch of the upper Clackamas River on land owned and stewarded by the Confederated Tribes of Warm Springs.

This one-mile-long section of the river provides essential habitat for culturally significant fish species including spring chinook, coho salmon and bull trout.

This site offered great potential for enhancing the habitat for these threatened and endangered fish. The site had also been heavily impacted by years of unauthorized public use of the private property and this project will help mitigate that damage and prevent further degradation.

To restore these important habitats, we reconnected several historic side channels to increase floodplain and off channel habitats. We sourced large wood which had burned in a local wildfires, to install in and around the channels and floodplain areas. Large wood is an important component for the creation and maintenance of salmon habitat in our local rivers and streams and creates complex habitat with areas for fish to hide from predators, rest and feed.

Using heavy machinery, we excavated and graded the channel and floodplain areas and installed large wood and boulders. This video shows a channel area before construction. You can see the excavated channel here in this video of the same location. Juvenile salmonids benefit from off channel areas where there is slower waters and increased food abundance.

This project, funded by OWEB, National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration and the Confederated Tribes of Warm Springs, will increase biodiversity and climate resilience. We nearly doubled the amount of side and off channel habitat at the site, placed 500 pieces of large wood in the river and floodplain areas and replanting the site with over 20,000 native trees and shrubs.