Page 8C
OUTSIDE
East Oregonian
Saturday, August 6, 2016
PILOT ROCK
BLOOMIN’ BLUES
Birch Creek assessment nears fi nish
Plan will prioritize
restoration needs
By GEORGE PLAVEN
East Oregonian
Photo by Bruce Barnes
Common willow herb
Few notice fl ower in
crowded undergrowth
Name: Common willow
herb
Scientifi c name: Epilo-
bium ciliatum
This small plant is found
in wet places throughout
most of North America. Even
though it is rather common,
few people have probably
seen it as it is usually crowded
in among other plants in
dense undergrowth, and has
little to catch someone’s eye,
even when blooming.
The plant is generally less
than 6 inches tall. Its leaves
are usually 2-4 inches long,
lance-shaped, with fi nely
serrate edges. The fl owers
are pink or white, and about
a quarter to a half inch wide.
There are four petals, each
with a deep notch at the tip,
giving the fl ower the appear-
ance of having four pairs of
narrow petals. Each fl ower
looks like it is attached at the
tip of a long slender branch
up to 4 inches long, arising
from the main stem at the
point where the leaves are
also attached.
Technically, what look
like branches are instead an
essential part of the fl ower.
They are actually slender
linear pods where the seeds
are formed. As the fl owers
mature, the petals drop off,
leaving the pods looking like
bare stems that some wood-
land creature bit the tips off
of.
The common name,
“willow herb,” comes from
the leaves looking similar to
the leaves of most willows.
Epilobium is from the Greek
“epi” meaning upon, and
“lobos” for pod, referring to
the fl ower placed upon the tip
of the seed pod. Ciliatum is a
reference to fi ne hairs, cilia,
which form longitudinal
lines along the main stems.
This plant species has
been used by various Indian
tribes to relieve leg pains
and for a poultice for muscle
cramps. One tribe used it to
relieve diarrhea.
Where to fi nd: Look
for this plant in damp shady
places in the woods, usually
crowded in among other
plants enjoying a cool spot
with plenty of water.
— Bruce Barnes writes
Bloomin’ Blues weekly
BRIEFLY
Fall salmon
seasons begin
on Columbia
HERMISTON —
Fisheries managers are
expecting another monster
run of fall chinook up the
Columbia River in 2016,
which should bode well for
anglers above Bonneville
Dam.
The fall salmon season
began Monday, Aug. 1 and
runs through Dec. 31 from
Buoy 10 all the way to the
Highway 395 Bridge in
Pasco, Washington. Tucker
Jones, Columbia River
program manager for the
Oregon Department of Fish
& Wildlife, said forecasts call
for 960,000 chinook to return
to the river, which is shy of
last year’s record run of 1.3
million but well above the
10-year average of 705,000.
“We anticipate another
really good year this
year,” Jones said. “For
the last three years or
so, fall salmon fi shing in
the Columbia has been
remarkable, and not just
in the estuary. Fishing has
been lights out from Buoy
10 all the way to the state
line above McNary Dam,
and 2016 looks to continue
that red hot trend.”
Coho returns could be
a bit more unpredictable,
according to Jones. Last
year, ODFW expected a
run of 540,000, though only
171,000 actually made it
back into the river.
“We’re not typically off
by that much,” he said.
This year’s forecast calls
for 323,000 coho, of which
80,000 would be anticipated
to cross Bonneville Dam.
The biggest change
for the 2016 fall season
deals with bag limits for
ESA-listed steelhead bound
for the Snake River.
In 2015, Jones said
anglers nearly over-harvested
steelhead, which would have
resulted in the fi shery closing
early. With another below-
average run in the forecast,
ODFW is telling anglers they
can only keep one steelhead
after Sept. 1 from Bonneville
Dam to McNary Dam, and
after Nov. 1 from McNary
Dam to the Highway 395
Bridge.
Other regulations vary
by location on the Columbia
River, and can be found on
ODFW’s website at www.
dfw.state.or.us.
Free ammo
trial at Eagle
Cap Shooters
Association
JOSEPH — Hunters
and shooters from Eastern
Oregon are invited to try out
non-lead ammunition for free
Aug. 20 at the Eagle Cap
Shooters Association.
A variety of cartridges
will be provided by the
Oregon Zoo’s Non-Lead
Hunting Education Program
to test the accuracy of
non-lead versus lead ammo.
A special demonstration
will also compare terminal
performance of common
lead hunting bullets and
non-lead bullets in water
barrels and ballistic gelatin.
“This is a great
opportunity to try the latest
technology in hunting
ammunition without having
to buy any,” said Leland
Brown, the zoo’s non-lead
ammunition outreach
coordinator and a lifelong
outdoorsman. “Non-lead
ammunition offers great
weight retention, consistent
expansion and exceptional
accuracy, all without lead.”
The event runs from
noon to 5 p.m. Shooters are
encouraged to bring their
own fi rearms and current
bullets.
For more information,
visit www.eaglecapshooters.
com.
It’s a story all too familiar in Eastern
Oregon and the American West.
Birch Creek, a tributary of the
Umatilla River south of Pendleton,
is the home waters of nearly half the
basin’s wild steelhead and regarded by
local tribes as a fi sh factory. However,
the watershed fl ows predominantly
through private land, including farms
and ranches that rely on fl ows from the
creek for their livelihood.
It takes careful planning to strike
a balance between the needs of land-
owners and the environment. That’s
why a team of partners has come
together to develop the Birch Creek
Watershed Assessment and Action
Plan, to identify areas where resto-
ration is needed and prioritize projects
moving forward.
After two years of work, agencies
say the plan is nearly complete. The
Confederated Tribes of the Umatilla
Indian Reservation contracted with
GeoEngineers in Pendleton on the
study, in collaboration with the Umatilla
Basin Watershed Council, Umatilla
County Soil and Water Conservation
District, U.S. Forest Service and
Oregon Department of Fish & Wildlife.
Together, they’ve held a series of
fi ve outreach meetings with landowners
in Pilot Rock to gather feedback. The
most recent meeting was held in July,
where project leaders presented their
fi ndings and stressed the need for
cooperation from the public.
“It’s going to take your guys’ help,”
said Mike Lambert, fi sheries program
supervisor for the tribes. “Hopefully,
we can start working with you to
address some of these things.”
The assessment is primarily geared
toward fi sh recovery and water quality,
Lambert said. A technical team made
up of experts from the different groups
walked along the watershed surveying
physical characteristics of streams,
how they’re functioning and how they
impact steelhead habitat.
Along the way, they noted a number
of limiting factors for fi sh in Birch
Creek. In some reaches, the creek is
loaded with sediment, cut off from
its fl oodplain and dries up entirely.
Fisheries managers estimate there
Staff fuke photo by E. J. Harris
In Jan. 2015, old tree snags still sit where they were cabled in to
the bank of Birch Creek in 1989 by the ODFW during a stream bank
stabilization project.
”It’s going to take us
a long time to get
back on a recovery
trajectory.”
— Rick Christian,
Project manager for the CTUIR
are approximately 1,500 steelhead
returning to the creek, with the capacity
for 2,500-3,000 if the watershed were
fully functioning.
The action plan lists fi ve streams that
currently support steelhead, including
Lower Birch, East Birch, West Birch,
Pearson Creek and Bear Creek. These
“Tier 1” streams are at the top of the
list to restore and protect for the benefi t
of fi sh.
But an overwhelming majority — up
to 95 percent — of the basin is private
land, which means project managers
need buy-in from hundreds of land-
owners in the community. Lambert
said the plan takes into account not
only what’s best for fi sh, but for the
landowners, too.
“When you have water connected to
the fl oodplain, you can see the benefi ts
to farming and crops as well,” he said.
The tribes are no strangers to
this kind of detailed planning in the
Umatilla Basin. A similar study was
done in 2004 on Meacham Creek,
and work to restore the fl oodplain
has proven successful in recent years.
The same technical team is also eying
an ambitious study of the main stem
Umatilla River.
Rick Christian, project manager for
the CTUIR, said projects along Birch
Creek will likely be more site-specifi c
owing to the amount of private land. He
foresees efforts in the future to boost
fi sh passage and stabilize stream banks
by planting new riparian vegetation and
installing fencing to keep out livestock.
The action plan is the tool they will
use to identify those needs, Christian
said. That, in turn, will help support
applications for funding to get the work
done.
“It helps us prioritize where we
should be working, instead of being
opportunistic,” Christian said. “We’ll
still work with landowners whenever
they come to us.”
Planning on Birch Creek has cost
approximately $300,000, which the
tribes paid for out of the 2008 Fish
Accords with Bonneville Power
Administration. Christian believes
the Birch Creek assessment should be
made public by sometime early next
year. For now, they are continuing to
gather local input.
While the creek won’t ever return to
pristine, prehistoric conditions, Chris-
tian said they can take steps to move it
in that direction.
“It took us a long time to get here,”
he said. “It’s going to take us a long
time to get back on a recovery trajec-
tory.”
———
Contact George Plaven at gplaven@
eastoregonian.com or 541-966-0825.
Paddler’s paradise at Port Orford Heads
JOEL GORTHY
The Register-Guard
EUGENE — Dave Lacey shouts over
his shoulder, his voice carrying through
salty air laced with a pungent shrimp-
and-sour mystery aroma: “Have you ever
smelled whale’s breath before?”
As the scent hits them, four kayakers
in boats behind Lacey’s exchange looks
and comments that refl ect more delight
than disgust. Rarely does one get to tail
a whale so closely — to paddle through
the precise place where, moments
before, the mighty mammal surfaced,
spouted and left lingering evidence of
its most recent visit to the submarine
seafood buffet.
Actually, Lacey experiences this kind
of thing all the time as owner of South
Coast Tours. His is the only company
in this part of the state offering guided
near-shore kayak excursions such as
the wildlife-viewing trip happening this
day off of the magnifi cently looming,
teeming-with-life Port Orford Heads.
But as is true on this overcast
September morning, most of his wetsuit-
clad clients experience new-to-them
revelations around every rocky corner
and in every cave and cove as they ply
Oregon’s rugged southern coastline.
A brief whale tale
Today, a juvenile gray whale quickly
and silently rolls at the surface, near
a sheer rock cliff plunging into deep
water no more than 30 yards away.
Lacey orders his fl otilla to hold position.
The creature’s next rise could happen
anywhere in the vicinity. An oval of
surface water suddenly swells and shim-
mers like a soon-to-boil pot just off the
port side of one kayak. That’s a sign of
a powerful tail thrust below, Lacey says.
Paddles pause; pulses pound. Then,
a spout!
“There! It’s moving fast,” Lacey
yells, motioning toward a rocky point,
maybe 100 yards seaward, where the
silvery-gray leviathan seems to be
speeding toward open ocean.
Everyone follows Lacey at full paddle
for a few minutes through increasing
seas and the aforementioned whale’s
breath. After crossing Hells Gate — a
gap between the headlands and offshore
Tichenor Rock — the group slips into
the heads’ last south-facing cove to
watch for more signs of the whale.
Rounding the corner and heading
north from here would mean full-on
western exposure to the Pacifi c’s potent
waves and winds, a challenge best left
to expert ocean paddlers. So, Lacey typi-
cally makes this the turnaround point of
a 3.65-mile, 2.5-hour tour.
The whale’s departure for unseen
waters becomes certain after several
minutes, so the kayakers dip their
paddles and swing their bows back
toward the beach.
Sights, sites to behold
Certain members of this expedition
actually started the day feeling slightly
disappointed. Port Orford Heads was
Lacey’s backup destination if anything
short of perfect conditions prevented
paddling into the extraordinary but
more-exposed “Arches Territory” of the
Samuel H. Boardman Scenic Corridor,
starting some 40 miles south of here.
While that certainly would be a treat,
perhaps some future day when glassy
seas allow navigating one of the world’s
greatest near-shore scapes of stone
arches, caves, rock islands and secluded
beaches, Port Orford Heads hardly is a
letdown. In fact, in terms of bang for the
buck, this surely is one of the Oregon
Coast’s most rewarding and accessible
areas for ocean paddling.
For one, the coves and inlets in the
south face of the colossal stone head-
lands, and the crescent shape of Port
Orford’s entire south-facing bay, can
foster calmer seas.
“The South Coast is unique in that
way, in that we have a bunch of head-
lands that block the wind and the swell,
which enables us to get out on the ocean
more often than you can on probably the
rest of the Oregon Coast,” Lacey says.
It also allows Port Orford to operate
the only natural, open-ocean harbor for
600 miles in any direction, and its “dolly
dock” — one of only six in the world,
where a fi xed crane hoists fi shing boats
in and out of the water — can be seen up
close as kayakers come and go from the
adjacent beach.
The sheltering headlands also make it
predictably possible, depending on tides,
to guide small watercraft into sea caves
and under natural bridges, including a
large, so-called “aquarium arch.”
Paddlers here also get to explore
Nellie’s Cove. From 1934 to 1970, U.S.
Coast Guard “surfmen” responded to
maritime distress calls by scrambling down
532 steps from the station above (now the
Port Orford Lifeboat Station Museum),
then launching their rescue boats down a
track into the snug harbor. Though the old
boathouse burned down in the late 1970s,
the ruins include concrete pilings, metal
tracks and a high breakwater wall next to
a secluded, rocky pocket beach.
“This place is so awesome; I just love
Nellie’s Cove,” Lacey marvels as he
stands atop the concrete wall and gazes
over the shallow cove, a snorkeling and
diving destination that glows like the
tropics when the light hits it right.
A big slice of sea life
Just offshore south of Port Orford is
Redfi sh Rocks Marine Research Reserve,
a protected reef site where a series of
vertebrate-like rocks jut from the ocean.
It is an especially diverse habitat zone for
sea life, from fi sh and invertebrates that
thrive in the sandy beds and reefs below
to seabirds and mammals that utilize the
rocks above the surface.
For recreational boaters like today’s
party, a more-accessible snapshot of
marine life comes into focus below Port
Orford Heads, just around the dock’s
breakwater boulders.
Not only are gray whales commonly
seen here from late winter all the way
through to the fall migration, and more
often than not during summer trips, the
heads are home to Oregon’s second-
largest rookery of Steller sea lions and
some of the West Coast’s most abundant
kelp beds.
While paddling among the swaying
bulbs and fronds that form the crowns of
these kelp forests — stalks trailing down
into mesmerizing aquamarine waters
— today’s fl oating tourists encounter an
oceanic menagerie.
Gregarious harbor seals and Cali-
fornia sea lions course through the kelp
and even glide alongside the kayaks,
fl ashing whiskery smiles.
Wispy cotton ball-size jellyfi sh and
their tiny tentacles sway with the sea.
At any place where water laps
against rock, varied starfi sh, anemones
and mussels appear between swells.
Gulls, cormorants, common murre
and pigeon guillemots swoop, splash
and rest on rocks; a great blue heron lifts
off from the shore and does a dramatic
low pass over the water; a black oyster-
catcher almost blends in with a wet rock
but is betrayed by its hot-lava beak and
pure-sunshine eyes.
Lacey says tour-goers on other days
might enjoy even rarer sights such as sea
butterfl ies, lion’s mane jellyfi sh, harbor
porpoise, ancient murrelets and tufted
puffi ns.
Struck by the greatness of it all
After a mostly silent return voyage,
as if entranced by their swishing paddle
strokes or lost in the day’s freshly made
memories, the tour-goers haul their
kayaks up from the beach to Lacey’s
waiting truck and trailer.
Dacotah Splichalova of Port Orford
is no stranger to this coast’s charms.
But even her eyes are open wider after
today’s outing.
“I call this ‘where the wild things
are,’ this place; there are rocks that just
protrude out of the sea, pounded by
nature’s undulation,” she says. “But this
is my fi rst time kayaking out there, and
so being right up close to this nature
and to this wild is such a different
perspective. It’s like, you can see it from
the road and it still looks small, but then
when you’re right at the foot of it ... you
realize how small you are in comparison
with all this greatness.”