The Columbia River Basin

A watershed is the area that drains to a common waterway, such as a stream, lake, estuary, wetland, aquifer, or even the ocean is termed a watershed.

A riparian area is the interface between land and a stream. Soil conservation occurs in these biodiversified aquatic ecosystems. Stream riparian environments are of importance in that they support higher species richness and densities of wildlife. Riparian areas serve fish, birds, and wildlife with food, shelter, and water. These beautiful areas are more than often just a small percentage of the landscape, but are usually also the most diverse and productive plant and animal biomass zones.

These environments also lend benefit to society due to the multiple and intertwined ecological roles that stream riparian areas offer. They serve as migration routes and gateways to forests for many different species. Due to the linear shape of these areas, the frequency and variety of plant communities they come into contact with is very high. Therefore, riparian streams act as "living filters:" intercepting and absorbing sediments, storing and transforming nutrients and pollutants from adjacent surroundings that make their way to society's drinking water. Thanks to these habitats, up to 90% of nitrogen concentrations and 50% of phosphorus concentrations can be reduced. Excess of these elements would otherwise encourage undesirable growth of algae and weeds.

Clean Water - Insect Outbreaks and Watersheds

Mountain pine bark beetle outbreaks are causing rapid, unprecedented change in the headwater forests of Western North America. Infestation and mortality currently threaten more than 80% of the basal area of many lodgepole pine dominated stands across the West. In Colorado, bark beetle mortality now exceeds 1.5 million acres and the outbreak is projected to ravage 85 to 90% of the mature lodgepole ecosystems in Colorado and Wyoming within the next five years. The consequences of this extensive canopy disturbance and subsequent management activities will characterize western watersheds and forest landscapes for decades to come.

Briefing Paper | RMRS Hot Topic

Stream Temperature Modeling

Stream and river temperature is an important aspect of fish and other aquatic organisms' health and sustainability. Most species need cool water to survive--as natural streams regiments are altered due to human intervention (e.g. dams, irrigation withdrawals, deforestation, diversions, etc.), they are often found to exceed natural temperatures and thus the stream's water-quality is limited. Elevated stream temperatures can negatively impact cold-water fish species, such as threatened or endangered salmonids. Natural factors in stream temperature include atmospheric radiation, stream volume, surface area of the stream, shade, air temperature, water inflow and outflow, and changes in longitudinal temperature trajectories downstream of harvested areas (1997 Moore & Miner). Although the influences of stream temperature appear to be simple, we have much to learn about these complex processes (2003 Johnson, S).

Stream temperature modeling research is being conducted at the Boise Aquatic Sciences Lab, using inexpensive digital temperature loggers, geographic information systems (GIS), and remote sensing technologies to boost the development of temperature models useful at broad spatial scales.

Research Scientists: Dan Isaak (data & modeling)| Charlie Luce | Bruce Rieman

Science Professionals: David Nagel (GIS & Modeling) | Donna Horan (GIS & Modeling)

Climate Change, Water, and Aquatic Ecosystems

Environmental trends associated with a warming climate are occurring rapidly in the Rocky Mountains. These trends will affect the spatial and temporal distribution of water resources, habitats, and disturbance in aquatic ecosystems. Threats from reduced runoff, increased flow variability, increased temperature, increased wildfires, lost snowpack storage, and reduced vegetation cover affect water users and aquatic biota alike. The complex challenges posed by climate warming will require proactive, informed management if significant alteration of aquatic systems is to be avoided.

Briefing Paper

Watershed Processes

GRAIP- Quantifying and Prioritizing Road Impacts

The Geomorphic Road Assessment and Inventory Package (GRAIP) is a process and a set of tools for analyzing the impacts of roads on forested watersheds. GRAIP combines a road inventory with a powerful GIS analysis tool set to predict sediment production and delivery, mass wasting risk from gullies and landslides, stream diversion potential, culvert maintenance and fish passage at stream crossings.

Briefing Paper   |   GRAIP Website

Remotely Assessing and Monitoring Channel Physical Habitat

NASA’s Experimental Advanced Airborne Research Lidar (EAARL) was used to continuously map three-dimensional channel and floodplain topography, in streams that provide spawning habitat of a federal listed (threatened) population of Chinook salmon. Data were acquired over 200 km of streams in low-flow conditions with high water clarity in October, 2004, in Idaho’s Bear Valley Creek, a tributary stream in the upper Middle Fork Salmon River drainage.

Briefing Paper

River Bathymetry Toolkit (RBT)

Traditional techniques for describing and understanding aquatic physical habitat in streams have focused on manual measurements of channel topography. New remote sensing techniques, such as airborne water-penetrating Light Detection and Ranging (LiDAR) and boat-mounted acoustic sensors can produce highly accurate Digital Elevation Models (DEMs) with continuous coverage of long segments of channels and stream networks. The US Forest Service and ESSA Technologies have developed a suite of GIS tools, the River Bathymetry Toolkit (RBT), for processing high resolution DEMs of channels. Our goal is to characterize in-stream and floodplain geomorphology to support aquatic habitat analyses and numerical models of flow and sediment transport. The (RBT) is available for free and is under active development.

River Bathymetry Toolkit (RBT)

Western Watersheds and Climate Change Workshop

The Western Watersheds and Climate Change: Water and Aquatic System Tools workshop was held from November 17-19, 2009 in the Denver/Boulder area of Colorado. This workshop brought together the management and research community to 1) share knowledge and tools that are currently available to address water and climate change, and 2) identify additional tools that are needed to adequately address water and climate change issues in Forest Plan revisions, project level decisions, and partner activities.

Link to Presentations

Clean Water - Insect Outbreaks and Watersheds

Mountain pine bark beetle outbreaks are causing rapid, unprecedented change in the headwater forests of Western North America. Infestation and mortality currently threaten more than 80% of the basal area of many lodgepole pine dominated stands across the West. In Colorado, bark beetle mortality now exceeds 1.5 million acres and the outbreak is projected to ravage 85 to 90% of the mature lodgepole ecosystems in Colorado and Wyoming within the next five years. The consequences of this extensive canopy disturbance and subsequent management activities will characterize western watersheds and forest landscapes for decades to come.

Briefing Paper | RMRS Hot Topic

Climate Change, Water, and Aquatic Ecosystems

Environmental trends associated with a warming climate are occurring rapidly in the Rocky Mountains. These trends will affect the spatial and temporal distribution of water resources, habitats, and disturbance in aquatic ecosystems. Threats from reduced runoff, increased flow variability, increased temperature, increased wildfires, lost snowpack storage, and reduced vegetation cover affect water users and aquatic biota alike. The complex challenges posed by climate warming will require proactive, informed management if significant alteration of aquatic systems is to be avoided.

Briefing Paper