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 has:   

• Protected a steelhead stronghold in the heart of the sagebrush-steppe on Oregon’s John Day River

• Created a new wellness park for the City of Alamosa on the banks of Colorado’s Upper Rio Grande     

Oregon’s John Day River:

On Oregon’s Wild and Scenic John Day River, WRC has wrapped up a major accomplishment at Thirtymile Creek that will benefit the river’s critical run of wild steelhead, conserve prime habitat for wildlife and improve public river access at the heart of a spectacular river canyon.

After a five-year effort, we completed transfer of the Rattray and Campbell ranches to the Bureau of Land Management, forever protecting the lower nine miles of Thirtymile Creek, right where it flows into the John Day. The effort protected 10 miles of the main-stem John Day and 22,032 acres of prime wildlife habitat. At the same time, we secured prized public boating access to a prime stretch of the river and created a new recreational gateway to 78,000 acres of rugged sagebrush country—public land that was previously impossible to reach without a boat. Now open to the public, these lands deliver the only public river access on a remote, 70-mile stretch of the John Day. Boating this reach—one of the most scenic multi-day wilderness floats in the Pacific Northwest—previously required a five-day float from the upstream put-in at Clarno Bridge, unless you paid to drop your boat in (or take it out) at Rattray Ranch. Now, this mid-way access point is open to all, free of charge.

Beneath brick-red cliffs, Thirtymile Creek feeds the lower John Day with its largest source of cold water. When the John Day runs low and warm in summer and fall, Thirtymile Creek comes through with reliable, cold flows just when wild salmon and steelhead need them most. The creek contains key spawning and rearing habitat that will keep lower-river steelhead—one of the healthiest wild populations in the Columbia system—going strong. Thirtymile Creek is also vital for Chinook salmon and for the John Day’s diverse wildlife, including Oregon’s largest herd of California bighorn sheep.

Throughout the project, we worked with the Oregon Department of Fish and Wildlife, BLM and Gilliam County Soil and Water Conservation District to remove four fish-passage barriers in Thirtymile Creek and transform two former cattle ranches into thriving fish and wildlife habitat. With the land in BLM hands, the restoration work will continue with a number of local partners.

While this chapter is complete, WRC continues its efforts to improve the health of the Wild and Scenic John Day River—and to keep its water flowing for fish and wildlife and its unique outdoor adventures open to all.

Colorado’s Upper Rio Grande:     

On the banks of the upper Rio Grande, we’ve added a stunning new riverfront park to the city of Alamosa. In October, we cut the ribbon on Alamosa Riparian Park, which now protects more than a mile of open space along the Rio Grande. Long-anticipated by the community, the park joins the city’s growing green-space offerings, which connect residents to their backyard river. The park itself adds more than five miles of nature trails where people can stay active and reconnect with the outdoors.

Beneath the shade of tall cottonwoods (or alamosas, in Spanish), visitors can walk, run, bike and view birds and wildlife year-round. The park is also a de facto sanctuary for creatures like endangered southwest willow flycatcher, river otter and bald eagle.

Before October, access to the Rio Grande was limited, even though the river winds along the edge of town. The community has wanted better access to the river for years and, in 2017, we partnered with the city to make this a reality. WRC purchased two adjacent properties from families who, like WRC, wanted to keep the land undeveloped as public open space. This fall, we conveyed the land to the city, and now Alamosa Riparian Park is open for all.

Creation of this outstanding public resource inspired broad local support, including from the city, Alamosa County, San Luis Valley Great Outdoors, the Gates Family Foundation, Rio Grande Watershed Conservation and Education Initiative, Rio Grande Headwaters Restoration Project, U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service and many others. Great Outdoors Colorado (GOCO), which is funded by the Colorado Lottery, ranked Alamosa Riparian Park as its top Open Space Project in 2018 and awarded a major grant to the project so the city could buy the land.

WRC’s efforts in Alamosa are part of our broader work in the San Luis Valley, where we are conserving tens of thousands of acres of key habitats and providing new public access to the Rio Grande and its tributaries. In 2015, we established the San Luis Valley Conservation Fund together with the LOR Foundation, Rio Grande Headwaters Land Trust and Colorado Open Lands, with the goal of accelerating conservation efforts

Conclusion

The John Day and the Alamosa Riparian Park 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 is:   

• Saving Open Space and Salmon Streams in Washington’s Methow Valley

• Protecting the Place Where Bighorns are Born along Idaho’s Snake River

Washington’s Methow and Chewuch Rivers:     

Flowing cold and clear beneath the snowcapped peaks of Washington’s North Cascades, the Methow River is a salmon stream of great importance. It is the centerpiece of the scenic Methow Valley, fed by icecold creeks that tumble out of the rugged Pasayten Wilderness at the edge of the Canadian border. For years, the river was heavily diverted for irrigation, but today it is the focus of extensive efforts to recover its surviving fish runs. With much of the system protected within national forests and wilderness, there are high hopes that the Methow will once again become a haven for salmon and steelhead of the upper Columbia basin.

The Methow Valley is also a hugely popular travel destination. Tens of thousands of people visit each year to chase wild steelhead, ski the largest cross-country trail system in North America, raft, climb, hunt and enjoy a string of tiny, historic towns.

In the heart of the Methow Valley, Western Rivers Conservancy acquired two properties in 2018 to improve fish habitat and preserve the valley’s natural beauty. The opportunity is tremendous, as both properties trace designated Critical Habitat for Upper Columbia River spring Chinook and contain key habitat for Columbia River steelhead and bull trout. First we acquired the 328- acre Wagner Ranch, which spans 1.6 miles of the Chewuch River, the Methow’s largest tributary. Situated next to the Methow Wildlife Area, the ranch is one of the largest blocks of private river frontage left in the valley and is highly vulnerable to development. Then we purchased the 35-acre Stafford Ranch along the Methow River, including a critical groundwater right needed to reestablish flows in dry side channels that are crucial to fish.

WRC will convey the properties to the Yakama Nation, which is committed to stream restoration and conservation in the Methow Valley. Through its capable stewardship program, the tribe plans to restore offchannel areas, floodplains, wetlands and riparian vegetation, making a lasting difference for salmon and steelhead and moving the needle on our shared greater vision to save the fish runs of the upper Columbia Basin.

The Wagner Ranch itself was once owned by the Haub family, longtime community leaders in the valley and the developers of historic Winthrop. On top of the ecological benefits, the project will uphold the rich natural heritage, history and rural character of this part of the Methow Valley.

Idahos’s Snake River:

As the Snake River makes its way toward the Columbia, it carves the rugged depths of Hells Canyon, the deepest river gorge in North America and one of the most stunning river reaches on Earth. High above, bighorn sheep defy gravity as they poke along the sheer rock walls of the canyon cliffs. Populations of Rocky Mountain bighorn sheep were once abundant here, icons of the Snake, but today, Idaho’s Hells Canyon herd has only 150 head—a fraction of historic numbers. Remarkably, most of the ewes in this herd birth and rear their lambs on a single property: Ten Mile Creek Ranch.

This exceptional parcel of land traces four miles of the Snake River, just upstream of Hells Gate State Park and downstream of Craig Mountain Wildlife Management Area and Hells Canyon National Recreation Area. The 2,920-acre ranch is the herd’s best nursery, with as much as 80 percent of the Idaho ewes giving birth here in spring. What’s more, the ranch provides a critical link between these neighboring protected lands, expanding this habitat assemblage and increasing the Snake River’s ability to sustain these animals.

The reach of the Snake River flowing past the ranch also provides habitat for federally listed Snake River spring and fall Chinook and steelhead—fish that must overcome eight massive dams to reach their spawning waters high in the Rockies. Several Chinook redds are found in front of the property, and one of the Snake’s best steelhead runs lies just off the ranch’s banks. In addition to bighorns, the ranch is home to black bear, Rocky Mountain elk, mountain lion and mule deer.

In summer 2018, Western Rivers Conservancy purchased Ten Mile Creek Ranch. We are now working with the Idaho Department of Fish and Game to place a conservation easement on the property, preventing a 24-home subdivision and ensuring this crucial landscape remains intact, protected forever and healthy for the Snake River’s outstanding fish and wildlife.

Conclusion

The Methow, Chewuch and the Snake River/Ten Mile Creek Ranch 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:    

• Preserved a crucial stretch of Arizona’s East Verde River 

• Added 117 acres to Cottonwood Canyon State Park along Oregon’s John Day River

Arizona’s East Verde:     

In March, 2019, Western Rivers Conservancy preserved a crucial stretch of Arizona’s East Verde River and secured a recreational gateway to the Mazatzal Wilderness.

Thanks to Western Rivers Conservancy’s supporters, and to funding from the (recently reauthorized!) Land and Water Conservation Fund, we conserved the strategically located Doll Baby Ranch. It is now officially protected within the Tonto National Forest, and the primary access point for more than 250 square miles of public lands is now permanently open to all. These lands include a vast portion of the Mazatzal Wilderness, the Arizona National Scenic Trail and the Verde Wild and Scenic River corridor.

Just outside of Payson and roughly two hours from Phoenix, the Doll Baby Ranch traces a mile of the East Verde River, a lifeline for the diverse fish and wildlife on the northern edge of the Sonoran Desert. The East Verde is the least disturbed arm of the Verde, an outstanding Arizona river that flows into the Salt. Together, these streams sustain some of the most diverse fish and wildlife in the American Southwest.

With the completion of this project, a critical stretch of the East Verde has been conserved, and access to some of Arizona’s greatest outdoor recreation has been guaranteed for good. 

Oregon’s John Day River:

Also in spring 2019, WRC added 117 acres to Cottonwood Canyon State Park in Oregon. In March, we transferred the former Kirkpatrick Homestead to Oregon Parks and Recreation Department, significantly improving the park’s ability to manage a remote boating access site, roughly 10 miles downstream of the park’s main entrance.

Located at the northern end of the John Day Wild and Scenic River corridor, Cottonwood Canyon is Oregon’s second largest state park. It lies adjacent to vast, public BLM wilderness study areas, making it one of Oregon’s wildest state parks, set in sagebrush country with a dramatic river canyon and impressively diverse wildlife. The heart of the park is the John Day River, which hikers, anglers, hunters, boaters and birders visit year-round.

WRC created the park in partnership with OPRD in 2013, and has long sought to add this second property to enhance management. Now that we have, the stage is set for OPRD to make improvements to a crucial boating access site that anglers, hunters and paddlers rely on for trips down the John Day. The project also provides OPRD an important presence in this remote area of the state park.

Conclusion

The Ease Verde and the John Day projects are just some of our recent successes. 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 is:   

• Conserving a First Rate Trout Stream in Colorado

• Protecting habitat for Salmon and Steelhead in California’s Wine Country

Colorado’s Rio de Los Pinos:   

Completing our efforts on the Rio de Los Pinos, Western Rivers Conservancy has permanently protected some of the finest trout water in Colorado. In fall 2018, we conveyed our second property on the Los Pinos to the Rio Grande National Forest, protecting an additional 260 acres of prime open space and securing public access to a stunning stretch fly fishing water. Combined with the adjacent parcel we conserved last year, the land traces more than a mile of the Rio de Los Pinos along some its most accessible reaches, just off Highway 17, northeast of Chama, New Mexico.

The Los Pinos is a gem of a trout stream, with healthy populations of brown and rainbow trout. Native Rio Grande cutthroat once thrived here, and the river’s excellent cold-water habitat—including the reach that flows through these two properties—provides hope that these imperiled fish may one day be reintroduced.

Flowing from a series of alpine lakes in the San Juan Mountains, the Los Pinos tumbles through conifer forests, lush meadows and granite canyons over its 40-mile course. It loops into New Mexico before crossing back into Colorado and eventually feeds into the San Luis Valley of the Rio Grande.

Near Cumbres Pass, the Los Pinos enters a small, perched valley and slows to a broad meander, hemmed by open meadows and forests of spruce and fir, and an 1880s-era narrow-gauge train—the Cumbres & Toltec Scenic Railroad—carries sightseers up and down the valley.  

The valley’s unbroken natural beauty is highly desirable for subdivision and home construction. One of the largest blocks of private frontage near Cumbres Pass was owned by a family with deep, multi-generational ties to the San Luis Valley. The family wished to see their former summer pasture lands, which include wetlands and other features that attract migratory birds in spring and fall, permanently conserved as open space. WRC committed to protecting the properties, helping the family ensure these lands were permanently conserved.

We purchased both parcels, and with funding from the Land and Water Conservation Fund, conveyed the lands to the adjacent Rio Grande National Forest. Rather than being subdivided and developed, the properties will now remain intact, providing habitat for fish and wildlife and sustaining the hope that Rio Grande cutthroat can one day be reintroduced to the Rio de Los Pinos.

California’s Gualala River:

At the edge of Northern California’s wine country, Western Rivers Conservancy has launched an effort to protect a rare swath of old-growth redwood forest and rolling oak woodlands along the Wheatfield Fork Gualala River. The Wheatfield Fork is the largest of three major tributaries of the main-stem Gualala, one of the state’s most important and still-viable salmon and steelhead rivers.

The Wheatfield Fork, which meets the South Fork Gualala near the coastal town of Gualala, provides cold water and vital habitat for winter steelhead and coho salmon, populations that are dwindling throughout California. Like all forks of the Gualala, the Wheatfield Fork also supports abundant wildlife in an area that is threatened by vineyard and residential development.

Upstream from the town of Gualala, we are working to place a conservation easement on an extraordinary property—the 4,344-acre Silva Ranch. Conservation of the ranch will protect an important reach of the Wheatfield Fork as well as a series of cold tributary streams that flow through the property—more than six miles of fish-bearing streams in all. Our efforts will also protect 41 acres of majestic old-growth redwood trees and a landscape of rolling oak woodlands, grasslands and mixed conifer forest.

With its prime location and potential for more than 20 home sites, the ranch is highly vulnerable to both building development and intensive grape production. Instead, the conservation easement will forever protect the property’s ancient redwoods, its burbling fresh-water streams and rare oak studded chaparral that are so important to the region’s fish and wildlife. At the same time, roughly five percent of the ranch will be reserved for limited development or small-scale agriculture so the family can continue to earn a living, making the project viable and a true win-win for all.

The Silva Ranch is especially important because it lies next to 75,000 acres of already protected lands. Adding it to this assemblage will connect key habitats and multiply the benefits for fish and wildlife on a scale far greater than the property itself.

The future of coho and steelhead in California depends on rivers like the Gualala. The river harbors one of the southernmost runs of Northern California Steelhead, a threatened population. The Gualala River is also critical to the state’s recovery strategy for Central California Coast Coho, a distinct unit of endangered salmon. The Gualala Roach, a small minnow endemic to its namesake river, will also benefit from our conservation of the Silva Ranch.

Additionally, the property’s old growth redwoods provide superb habitat for threatened northern spotted owl. Bald eagles, red-legged frogs, tiger salamanders and a host of other animals that define Northern California all inhabit the ranch. Given the tremendous biological value of the property, our effort enjoys strong local and state support, and the state of California has dedicated funding to ensure the project’s success.

WRC anticipates placing the conservation easement on the ranch in the next year. Once we do, California’s redwood coast will have another critical refuge for native fish and wildlife, an outcome that meets the needs of conservation, a great river, family agriculture and California alike.

Conclusion

The Rio de Los Pinos and the Gualala projects are just some of our recent successes. 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 is:   

• Protecting an Oasis on California’s Mojave River

• Launching Our First Project in Washington's Methow Valley

California’s Mojave River:   

We did it! In October 2018 Western Rivers Conservancy permanently protected a rare stretch of California’s Mojave River as a haven for imperiled fish and wildlife.

Most of the Mojave River flows below ground, but along one very special stretch, the river is pushed to the surface by the underlying bedrock and forms a lush oasis in heart of the Mojave Desert. Thanks to your support, we protected a critical 3.5 miles of this stretch, including the most important stands of riverside forest along this entire reach of the river.

The property we protected is called Palisades Ranch, and its stands of cottonwoods and willows, along with the presence of a perennially flowing river, make it one of the Mojave Desert’s most important habitat areas for fish and wildlife. A true oasis, the property attracts 39 federally and state listed special-status wildlife species.

In October 2018, we conveyed the 1,647-acre ranch to our partner, the Mojave Desert Land Trust, which will now manage the property to ensure it forever remains a refuge for the region's diverse plants and wildlife. The California Wildlife Conservation Board, California Department of Fish and Wildlife, and the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service generously funded our transfer of the ranch to MDLT for permanent protection.

Washington’s Methow Valley:

The Methow Valley is a spectacular notch of cold rivers, pristine wilderness areas, rolling foothills and tiny, historic towns that cuts across eastern Washington. At the heart of the valley is the Methow River, a critical salmon and steelhead stream fed by smaller tributaries that tumble cold and clear from the North Cascade Mountains. The largest of these tributaries is the Chewuch River, where WRC has launched one of its newest conservation efforts.

The Chewuch is the headwaters of the Methow and provides healthy, unspoiled habitat for imperiled Chinook salmon, steelhead and bull trout. North of the town of Winthrop, WRC has purchased the historic 328-acre Wagner Ranch, which spans 1.6 miles of the Chewuch and abuts the 14,800-acre Methow Unit of Washington’s Methow Wildlife Area. The ranch was one of the largest contiguous tracts of privately owned riverfront left in the Methow Valley, which presented WRC with a tremendous conservation opportunity.

By purchasing the ranch and transferring it to the Yakama Nation, WRC will prevent hundreds of acres along this critical stretch of the Chewuch River from being subdivided and developed, the likely outcome if the ranch were left on the market. Our efforts will instead preserve the remote beauty of this historic ranch, while providing the Yakama the rare opportunity to restore a key stretch of the river where over a dozen different salmon habitat restoration opportunities have been identified. The project will enable improvements to side-channel and wetland connectivity and to riparian habitat that fish and wildlife depend on.

On top of the many benefits for fish and wildlife, the project will be a boon for people. Our efforts will safeguard the untouched character of this part of the valley, a setting that is cherished by countless hikers, cross-country skiers, hunters, birders, paddlers and anglers who visit and live in the Methow Valley. The Wagner Ranch itself is woven into the cultural fabric of the valley, formerly owned by the family who developed the Old West town of Winthrop, and later by the family who created the famed Sun Mountain Lodge. In the hands of the Yakama Nation, its existing open space and riparian habitat will remain undeveloped, serving the needs of fish and wildlife and all who enjoy the beauty of this unique slice of northern Washington.

Conclusion

The Mojave and Methow projects are just some of our recent successes. 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)