With funding from the California Coastal Conservancy, HCRCD worked in cooperation with landowners of the Grandy Ranch and Hackett Timber and Livestock to implement habitat restoration and protection projects on Price Creek Ranch and Howe Creek Ranch, two adjacent ranch properties.   Conservancy funds were utilized to improve habitat for steelhead trout and Coho and Chinook salmon in these Lower Eel River tributaries.  Project treatments included installing large wood and boulder in-stream structures to provide cover, building scour pools, protecting stream banks from erosion, planting over 59 acres with maple and redwood seedlings and cottonwood sprigs, and installing cattle-exclusion fence on Howe Creek.

Boulder weir with logs and/or rootwads incorporated.

8-10lb Steelhead in Crystal Creek HR Howe Project

Boulder hard point with live rootwad.

Livestock exclusion and control fencing with slide replanting.

Funding for this project has been provided in part with voter-approved Proposition 50 Bond Funds through a grant with the California State Coastal Conservancy, and with additional funds from California Department of Fish and Game, the Natural Resources Conservation Services and financial matches from the landowners.

HCRCD is lead agency on the implementation of the Salt River Ecosystem Restoration Project; a multi-year, multi-agency endeavor that takes a holistic, watershed-wide approach to addressing sediment, fish passage, flooding and drainage issues in the Salt River Watershed of Ferndale.