Services:

PMD Spring Creek Restoration

Issue:

The owners of the PMD Ranch and the Nelson Spring Creek Ranch had interest in restoring a small unnamed spring creek to restore spawning and rearing habitat for Yellowstone cutthroat trout. The creek originates from three individual springs on the Nelson Spring Creek Ranch and runs through the PMD Ranch until it joins the Yellowstone River. The creek was functioning as a ditch as a result of historic manipulation of the channel to provide dewatering of a wet meadow. The length of the stream was marginal habitat for fish and wildlife and provided very few grazing benefits. The landowners worked with the USDA NRCS Wildlife Habitat Incentives Program, landowner cost-share and Montana Department of Fish, Wildlife & Park's (MTFWP) Future Fisheries Improvement Program to fund the project. The landowners needed a design contractor that was certified as an NRCS Technical Service Provider (TSP).

Solution:

OASIS was retained to provide design and construction services for the project. The channel design solution included combining three different spring sources into one single thread channel to maximize flow rates and optimize cutthroat spawning habitat potential. Physical variability was designed and built into the new channel with associated shallow water wetlands to create trout rearing habitat and adult deep water winter refuge. TSP activities included acquisition of funding, reference reach characterization, flood frequency analysis, sediment transport modeling, design of channel geometry, hydraulic analysis of the channel sections, bioengineered bank design and floodplain grading.

Results:

The PMD spring creek is now a clear cold spring tributary that provides excellent trout rearing and spawning habitat to Yellowstone River fish. Each year following the restoration, increased fish observations have been made. With the habitat restored and well established, MTFWP will "seed" the stream with fertilized Yellowstone cutthroat trout eggs during the spring spawning season to imprint the fish to the stream. These fish will return in subsequent years to spawn and provide the Yellowstone River with a flush of new fish. The project should yield significant numbers of Yellowstone cutthroat trout to the Yellowstone River ecosystem.

Case Studies

Montana Department of Fish, Wildlife & Parks

Scientists from OASIS identified an isolated population of genetically pure native westslope cutthroat trout...
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Montana Department of Transportation

OASIS created wetland mitigation sites (banks) for MDT to provide credits that offset the loss of wetlands caused by road construction...
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Private Landowners

The owners of the PMD Ranch and the Nelson Spring Creek Ranch had interest in restoring a small unnamed spring creek...
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Montana Department of Fish, Wildlife & Parks

The Chadbourne Irrigation Diversion Dam on the Shields River near Clyde Park, Montana was degrading...
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