Creek Management on Deck Family Farm
- Laura Wayte
- 11 minutes ago
- 3 min read
How we work with the Long Tom Watershed Council to keep our water ways healthy
Last week we were visited by Amanda Reinholtz of the Long Tom Watershed Council for her regular monitoring of the creeks. She came to the farm to install thermometers in the creeks and talk with the students about her work.
This type of monitoring is important for regenerative farms, whose farming practices are holistic land-management that rehabilitates ecosystem health by restoring organic matter in soil, enhancing biodiversity, and improving the water cycle.
"It has been really rewarding to work with LTWC over the years," said John Deck, farm owner. "We appreciate their expertise and guidance which really allows us to be successful."
The two streams that run through Deck Family Farm - Owen's Creek and Turnbow Creek - have been improved in the 22 years the Decks have been here. Improvement included putting up fences to keep the animals and their manure out of the creeks, planting over 15,000 trees and shrubs across six acres along Turnbow Creek alone for shade and improving water crossings.
Turnbow Creek flows into Owens Creek downstream of the farm, which in turn flows into Bear Creek, then the Long Tom River. All that water eventually joins the Willamette River up near Peoria, between Harrisburg and Corvallis.
"We have been monitoring summer stream temperature at three sites at Deck Family Farm in these two creeks since about 2012," said Reinholtz. "It's part of a broader effort to better understand stream temperatures throughout the watershed."
"They are doing pretty well," she reported. "One really interesting thing we've seen in recent stream temperature monitoring data here is that water was actually cooler at the downstream end of the farm on Turnbow Creek than it was as it entered the farm property. Although it's really hard to isolate cause, one plausible explanation is that the combination of streamside plantings of trees and shrubs and beaver colonization of the area have created conditions where there is plenty of shade and increased interaction with cool groundwater, causing the creek to actually cool down as it flows through the farm."
The Long Tom Watershed Council has monitored as many as 30 sites throughout the watershed over the years, and currently is active at 8 sites.
Reinholtz, who is the Council's Habitat & Water Quality Specialist, explained why stream temperatures are important. She said many of the native species that live in our streams (fish, amphibians, macroinvertebrates) are sensitive to higher stream temperature, and can't survive if temperatures get too hot.
For example, Owens and Turnbow Creeks are both home to native coastal cutthroat trout, she said. These fish are happy in temperatures up to about 18 degrees celsius, and cannot survive in temperatures above about 22 degrees celsius. Higher stream temperatures can also contribute to water quality problems like harmful algal blooms.
"Generally, in the watershed, our temperature monitoring has shown that streams lower in the valleys get too hot in the summer to support our cutthroat trout, while tributaries at higher elevations remain cool enough through the hot summer months."
She said it is important therefore, that we help by enabling the trout and other species to move around throughout the watershed. For this reason, the Watershed is active in helping improve fish passage at road crossings and culverts, allowing fish to travel freely throughout the year to find food, cool summer refuges, places to spawn, etc.
With that in mind, Deck Family Farm worked with the Long Tom Watershed back in 2010 to replace a barrier culvert with a bridge. That bridge allows better access for the fish to freely pass up and down the stream throughout the year.
"Although beaver damming of streams does not always lead to downstream cooling, it has in the majority of cases scientifically studied," said Reinholtz. This adds yet another reason beaver make such helpful partners in looking after the health of the watershed, she said.
“We were happy to see beaver moving into Turnbow last year and have a goal to find ways to work with or around them where they don’t overly impact our operations,” said John Deck, who has served on the LTWC board of directors. “We can all live here if we know the value they provide.”