In a tributary of the Clackamas, just south of Damascus, changes are happening. Fish are spawning, and naturalists say habitat is improving. Work is underway to restore wildlife and aquatic habitat at this 500-acre natural area, and return clear water to Clear Creek.
A team led by Metro, which owns the site, has been working since 1996 to restore the Clear Creek Natural Area, the namesake of which feeds into the Clackamas River near Carver. In the latest phase of the work, crews are restoring the natural level of the land to the site.
“The broad goals were to try to restore the hydrology as much as possible, without tearing the whole place up,” said Peter Guillozet, a Metro natural resource scientist. The land, previously used for ranching, had been altered much from its natural state. In particular, ditches were added for drainage.
“We really focused in on these various ditches and tried to figure out how to level the site, more or less, without bringing material in or out," Guillozet said. The work, he said, included leveling out berms and ditches, filling ponds, and generally redirecting water towards where it used to flow.
Which is to say, everywhere. With ditches in place, water from the upper bench would flow right through and beyond the middle bench and head straight for the creek. By plugging these manmade ditches, the flow should instead spread throughout the middle bench, wetting the area and eventually turning the 60 acres into a wildflower covered wetland prairie.
Guillozet said there's very little wet prairie remaining in the Willamette Valley. A lot, he said, has been drained, ditched and converted to farmland.
The site was acquired and expanded through Metro's voter-approved 1995 and 2006 natural area bond measures, and restoration work is funded in part through Metro's 2013 parks and natural areas levy. The Clackamas River Basin Council and the Oregon Wildlife Heritage Foundation are also working at Clear Creek Natural Area.
The focus on this site is to restore not only land, but aquatic habitat, too. In Clear Creek itself, what goes on in the higher benches can have a huge effect.
Jonathan Soll, conservation science manager for Metro Parks and Nature, said high water temperatures in the summer, and low water volume in the late summer, are big challenges for salmon habitat in the Portland region.
He said water that moves more slowly over the site has a chance to percolate through deeper, cooler levels of soil, reaching the creek as cold, clean water.
"Instead of running outright during the rainy period as silt-laden water that’s moving through ditches, we improve water quality, water temperature, and the flow volume late in the summer," Soll said.
This will help the dozens of native species that depend on Clear Creek, many of which are focal species for Oregon or federally listed as threatened already, such as the coho salmon, Chinook salmon and steelhead.
The area has come a long way from the ranch it used to be, but there is still work to be done.
“It’s a forever project,” Guillozet said, and efforts will continue to invite native species and push non-native species out.