Protecting Land on the West's Outstanding Rivers

With backing from GlobalGiving donors, Western Rivers Conservancy is permanently protecting land along outstanding rivers across the western United States. Your gift supports the core costs of purchasing and conserving land for the benefit of fish, wildlife and people. Your contribution is dedicated to such efforts as preserving salmon and wildlife habitat, and creating new hiking trails, boating access and recreational opportunities.

Thanks to your support, Western Rivers Conservancy is:

• Returning water to Montana’s Wise River to protect the Big Hole’s artic grayling.

• Working to permanently protect Oregon’s Elk Creek and Crow Creek, two critical streams for Snake River steelhead.

Montana’s Wise River:
At the heart of Montana’s Big Hole Valley, Western Rivers Conservancy has launched an effort to return critically needed water to the Wise River by conserving a 200-acre ranch on the banks of this legendary trout stream.

The Wise is a major tributary to the Big Hole River, one of Montana’s renowned fly fishing streams, and the Lower 48’s last remaining stronghold for fluvial Arctic grayling. These river-dwelling grayling rear in the cold waters of just five Big Hole tributaries, one of which is the Wise. But these cold streams have been increasingly vulnerable to water withdraws, development and a warming climate, which threaten grayling populations throughout the Big Hole system.

For years, Arctic grayling were candidates for listing under the Endangered Species Act, which spurred local ranchers, farmers, conservationists and others to voluntarily pull together and improve conditions for the imperiled fish. The effort was largely successful. Now, protecting Big Hole tributaries and ensuring they remain clean and cold is critical to keeping these grayling populations alive. WRC’s efforts on the Wise River will help do exactly that.

This summer, WRC will purchase a 200-acre ranch that controls the upper-most water rights on the Wise River. Once we secure funding, we intend to convey the property to the Beaverhead-Deerlodge National Forest and ultimately dedicate the ranch’s water in-stream in partnership with Trout Unlimited’s Western Water Project. This will allow us to permanently return 11 CFS of water to the Wise River, a significant amount of water for a stream this size. The increased flows will benefit not just grayling, but westslope cutthroat trout and mountain whitefish, as well as the non-native rainbow and brown trout for which the Big Hole is famous among fly anglers.

In addition to being the West’s only stronghold for Arctic grayling, the Big Hole Valley is also a land of birds. Upstream of the Wise River confluence, the meandering nature of the Big Hole River creates extensive wetlands that support everything from sandhill crane and long-billed curlew (a migratory shorebird) to sage grouse, American kestrel, killdeer and golden and bald eagle. These and other species rely on the open country of the Big Hole Valley, including places like the ranch that WRC is working to protect.

Once we transfer the property to the U.S. Forest Service, this rare, unprotected inholding within the BeaverheadDeerlodge National Forest will be permanently conserved. Instead of being subdivided, the ranch will now remain intact forever, and its water will be returned to the Wise for the Big Hole’s Arctic grayling and other fish, which need every drop of clean, cold water they can get.

Oregon’s Elk and Crow Creeks:
In a remote and rugged river canyon in eastern Oregon, Western Rivers Conservancy has purchased 453 acres along Elk and Crow creeks, crucial headwater streams for two of Oregon’s wild and scenic rivers: Joseph Creek and the Grande Ronde.

The property lies roughly 13 miles west of Hells Canyon National Recreation Area and 11 miles northwest of the Zumwalt Prairie Preserve, one of the most intact native grasslands left in the West. To the south lies the Eagle Cap Wilderness, the crown jewel of the Wallowa Mountains.

The wild character of this landscape, and the clean, cold water that these streams provide, make for prime habitat for fish and wildlife. The stretches of Elk and Crow creeks that flow through the property are designated Critical Habitat for threatened Snake River summer steelhead, and both streams are home to native redband rainbow trout. The area is considered priority habitat for Rocky Mountain elk.

The entire area is also important to the Nez Perce Tribe. The confluence of Crow and Elk creeks marks the start of Joseph Creek, which was named for Chief Joseph, the iconic leader of the Wallowa band of the Nez Perce. The Wallowa band used the Joseph Creek canyon as a travel corridor.

WRC purchased the property in March, and we are now working to transfer the lands to the Wallowa-Whitman National Forest to ensure they remain permanently intact for the benefit of fish and wildlife.

Our efforts will also guarantee continued public access to major portions of the Wallowa Valley Ranger District and Hells Canyon National Recreation Area. Forest Service Road 4620 crosses part of the property and provides the primary access to four established campgrounds, several dispersed campgrounds, over 15 trails and a popular overlook. Conveying these lands to the U.S. Forest Service will ensure this cherished access point stays permanently open to all.

WRC plans to convey the property to the national forest in late 2021. Once that happens, the steelhead spawning habitat in Elk and Crow creeks, along with the property’s rich wildlife habitat and public access opportunities, will be protected in perpetuity.

Conclusion

The Wise River and Elk and Crow creeks projects are just some of our recent projects. WRC currently has over two dozen active projects in six states. With the support of GlobalGiving donors, Western Rivers Conservancy is expanding our efforts to protect riverlands for fish, wildlife and people.

We love to hear from our supporters. Please contact Anne Tattam at 503-241-0151, ext. 219 (or atattam@westernrivers.org) for further information. Thank you.

• Western Rivers Conservancy: Project Photos (PDF)
  

With backing from GlobalGiving donors, Western Rivers Conservancy is permanently protecting land along outstanding rivers across the western United States. Your gift supports the core costs of purchasing and conserving land for the benefit of fish, wildlife and people. Your contribution is dedicated to such efforts as preserving salmon and wildlife habitat, and creating new hiking trails, boating access and recreational opportunities.                                    

Thanks to your support, Western Rivers Conservancy has:     

• Protected Nursery Grounds for Idaho’s Hells Canyon Bighorn Sheep

• Conserved Another Mile Along the Gunnison River in Colorado

Idaho’s Snake River:

Stately and sure-footed, bighorn sheep are a sight to behold in river canyons across the western United States. Yet their survival depends on the West’s ability to preserve what remains of the region’s outstanding sheep habitat, and in eradicating disease that has taken a toll on bighorns for decades. To address both of these challenges, Western Rivers Conservancy completed a two-year conservation effort on Idaho’s Snake River that will preserve some of the finest nursery grounds and range habitat for bighorns in the Pacific Northwest.

Downstream of Hells Canyon, near Lewiston, Idaho, WRC has permanently conserved the 2,920-acre Ten Mile Creek Ranch, an intact property that is critical to the survival of Idaho’s northern Hells Canyon herd of Rocky Mountain bighorns.

Once ubiquitous in Hells Canyon, bighorns have seen steady declines since the mid-1800s, and today the Idaho Hells Canyon herd numbers only about 150 head. That’s where Ten Mile Creek Ranch comes in. With its steep breaks and rugged cliffs, the property offers sheep protection from predators and ideal lambing grounds for birthing and raising their young.

Remarkably, over half of the lambs on the Idaho side of the herd are born on this property. The ranch also provides an expanse of habitat that helps keep bighorns distanced from domestic sheep and goats, which can spread infectious disease.

To remove the potential of a 24-lot subdivision and protect this critical property, WRC purchased Ten Mile Creek Ranch in 2018. While we held the land, we worked with the Idaho Department of Fish and Game to place a conservation easement on it. Once the ranch was protected, we sold the land to a private conservation buyer, who will partner with the state to keep the land forever wild and unbroken for the sake of its sheep and other wildlife.

In addition to its bighorn habitat, the ranch spans four miles of the Snake River, a reach that includes Chinook salmon spawning redds and migration habitat for sockeye salmon, Chinook and steelhead. With its proximity to Hells Gate State Park to the north and the 78,000-acre Craig Mountain Wildlife Management Area to the south, the property will help unify a block of wild lands along the lower Snake River where bighorns, bears, elk and other wildlife still roam free, and where more than 100 species of birds are found.

With victories like this one at Ten Mile Creek, we hope the mighty bighorn will forever roam the river canyons of the West. They’re a great reminder that rivers are critical not just for fish, but for wildlife everywhere.

Colorado’s Gunnison River:     

WRC has protected another prized mile of Colorado’s lower Gunnison River by adding 150 acres to the Bureau of Land Management’s Dominguez-Escalante National Conservation Area!

The lower Gunnison is one of the West’s great geologic sculptors, carving dramatic sandstone formations and deep river canyons before meandering down to its confluence with the Colorado River at Grand Junction.

A haven for rare desert fish, the lower Gunnison is protected along much of its length, including within the Dominguez Escalante NCA. Yet even within the boundaries of the NCA, 16 miles of the river remained undesignated and therefore vulnerable to development.

To help fill that gap, WRC has been working to purchase strategic Gunnison River frontage for over a decade. Our first success came in 2012, when we conserved 400 acres at the entrance to the NCA and prevented a gravel mine on the banks of the river. A year later, we purchased 150 acres directly across the river, including another critical mile of Gunnison frontage and prime campsites for boaters. In September, we successfully added this property to the NCA, utilizing the Land and Water Conservation Fund to convey it to the BLM. The cooperation of the Colorado West Land Trust was crucial to the success of the project.

In all, we have conserved more than 8 miles of river frontage along the lower Gunnison within both the NCA and the Bangs Canyon Special Recreation Management Area, downstream. Our efforts are helping to secure a healthy future for four rare species of Colorado Basin warm-water fish, including razorback sucker and Colorado pikeminnow. The projects also benefit desert bighorn sheep, river otter, bald eagle and Rocky Mountain elk, not to mention the many human visitors who have the opportunity to canoe, camp and otherwise explore this spectacular slice of the Colorado Plateau.

Conclusion

The Snake and Gunnison River projects are just some of our recent projects. WRC currently has over two dozen active projects in six states. With the support of GlobalGiving donors, Western Rivers Conservancy is expanding our efforts to protect riverlands for fish, wildlife and people.

We love to hear from our supporters. Please contact Anne Tattam at 503-241-0151, ext. 219 (or atattam@westernrivers.org) for further information. Thank you.

• Western Rivers Conservancy: Project Photos (PDF)