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$1.6 million for area's salmon

State board awards grants to improve and purchase habitat

John Dodge, The Olympian
A dozen South Sound projects totaling more than $1.6 million to improve habitat for imperiled salmon were announced Thursday by the state Salmon Recovery Funding Board.

Statewide, $16.6 million in state and federal funds was distributed to tribes, local governments and nonprofit groups to repair estuaries, improve shoreline habitat, replace road culverts and other barriers that impede fish passage in streams and buy critical salmon habitat.

Since its creation by the 1999 state Legislature, the board has awarded $212 million in grants to more than 600 projects, all aimed at restoring salmon runs either listed on the federal Endangered Species Act list, or future candidates for listing.

Here's a look at some of the South Sound projects funded:

• The Nisqually River Land Trust received $349,860 to secure a conservation easement on 0.4 miles of Nisqually shoreline and about 0.25 miles of shoreline on a tributary stream in the McKenna area. The easement will create a contiguous protection zone stretching over 2 miles along the river.

• The Cascade Land Conservancy received $190,050 to help with the purchase of 150 acres of critical habitat where the north and south forks of the Skokomish River meet. It will allow restoration work in an area important to Hood Canal chinook salmon, summer chum salmon and bull trout, all ESA-listed species, according to the land conservancy grant application.

• The Skokomish tribe was awarded $190,000 to place woody debris in the upper south fork of the Skokomish River and tributaries to slow down the river and stream flows so fish have more places to rest, hide and grow.

"We're hoping to start placing the wood next year in the low flow time of year," said Keith Dublanica, natural resources director for the tribe.

• The South Puget Sound Salmon Enhancement Group garnered $168,800 to restore a small pocket estuary and sand spit next to a salmon-bearing stream at the Little Fish Trap cove northeast of Boston Harbor.

Back in the 1940s, landowners filled in the historical stream and tidal channel, diverting sediment into the estuary instead of the beach, which damaged estuary habitat, according to the project application submitted to the funding board.

• The salmon enhancement group also received $69,000 to help restore the beach at Thurston County's Frye Cove Park. Crews will remove about 1,000 cubic yards of riprap rock that armors about 400 feet of shoreline, replacing it with large woody debris to improve beach conditions and use of the nearshore area by forage fish and salmon.

• The Hood Canal Salmon Enhancement Group will have $81,799 to breach the north dike on the Hamma Hamma River to allow salmon to access 45 acres of salt marsh. The salmon group also will remove a road culvert to improve access to 2.5 acres of salt marsh on the south side of the river.

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