The sunrise mountain ranch covers approximately 15,000 acres in the sprague river watershed, klamath county, oregon

The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service (FWS), through the Partners for Fish and Wildlife program (CFDA 15.631), awarded a $490,000 Cooperative Agreement to Trout Unlimited, Inc. to support habitat restoration activities on the Sunrise Mountain Ranch in Klamath County, Oregon. The 5-year project, running from October 1, 2023 to September 30, 2028, will focus on restoring aquatic, riparian, and floodplain habitats along the Sprague River and its tributaries on the 15,000-acre ranch. Key restoration activities may include levee removal, water control structure maintenance, riparian fencing, fish passage and instream habitat improvements, riparian vegetation planting, and cattle exclusion measures. The goal is to improve water quality, increase habitat complexity and connectivity, and support native fish species like the endangered sucker. Trout Unlimited will work closely with the FWS, the ranch landowner, and other partners to develop and implement the prioritized restoration plan.

In total, nearly 20 miles of mainstem sprague river, north fork sprague, south fork sprague, meryl creek, and a small section of long creek flow through the property. Historically, this property boasted extensive aquatic, riparian, and floodplain habitats used by fish and wildlife species important to the klamath tribes. However, these habitats on the property have undergone substantial changes over the past 130 years, caused primarily by cattle and the infrastructure used for grazing. Floodplain connectivity has been significantly reduced due to levee construction and channel incision, riparian vegetation communities are now homogenous and dominated by non-native pasture grasses, stream channels lack structure and complexity and are no longer dynamic, and springs and wetlands have been disconnected or converted to upland habitat. With changes to the landscape and land use practices over time, the north fork and south fork are now major contributors to sediments and nutrients into the mainstem sprague river which adds to poor water quality and impaired conditions for native fishes. The priority areas for initial restoration are north fork and south fork sprague, but may be extended to other areas on the ranch (such as the mainstem sprague river) depending on funding availability.trout unlimited, the U.S. Fish and wildlife service, and the landowner are developing a conceptual and prioritized restoration plan for the aquatic, riparian, and floodplain habitats throughout the ranch. The causes of degradation on the ranch are extensive and will need a variety of restoration actions to improve riverscape health while maintaining sunrise mountain ranch as a working cattle operation. Depending on the problems associated with each stream section on the ranch, restoration plans may require levee removal, water control structure removal and maintenance, ditch filling, riparian fencing, fish passage and instream habitat improvements, low-tech process-based restoration (refer to pollock ET AL. 2018 wheaton ET AL. 2019), valley reset to stage-0 condition (refer to cluer and thorne 2014 powers ET AL. 2018 schneider ET AL. 2022), riparian vegetation planting, cattle exclusion fencing, cattle crossing hardening, and stock water well implementation.overall benefits of this project include: creating and improving fish habitat, improving sediment nutrient capture by placing instream structures, reconnection reactivation of the historic floodplain, riparian improvement, increase habitat complexity and sinuosity of the streams, bank stability, and added channel roughness to slow velocity and reduce impact of water on the banks. Although the ranch is technically outside the endangered species act designated critical habitat and range of suckers, proposed actions benefit suckers by reducing the amount of nutrient-rich sediments flowing downstream.due to the complex issues and expansive riparian acres and stream miles through the property, implementation of restoration goals will occur in phases both spatially and temporally. Restoration goals developed during the design stage will assess infrastructure limitations, incorporate landscape level improvements, and reflect the ecological interactions between the creeks and rivers on the ranch.