The yurok tribe watershed restoration roads program (YWRRP) is collaborating with the U.S. Fish and wildlife services partners for fish and wildlife program to reduce sediment and hydrologic impacts…

The Yurok Tribe has been awarded a $115,000 Cooperative Agreement from the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service's Partners for Fish and Wildlife program (CFDA 15.631) to reduce sediment and hydrologic impacts along the B-10 and B-100 road network in the Blue Creek watershed. The project aims to protect vital salmonid spawning habitat by decommissioning a legacy road segment and upgrading three additional road segments. Key activities include installing rolling dips, replacing 20 undersized culverts, and generating whole tree materials for use in the Yurok Tribal Fisheries Department's ongoing lower Blue Creek restoration efforts. This comprehensive effort is part of the Yurok Tribe's broader initiative to improve road systems and decommission old roads within the Blue Creek Sanctuary to protect water quality and native fish while ensuring safe access routes for ecological restoration, wildfire response, and long-term stewardship.

The yurok tribe watershed restoration roads program (YWRRP) is collaborating with the U.S. Fish and wildlife services partners for fish and wildlife program to reduce sediment and hydrologic impacts along the B-10 and B-100 road network to help protect vital salmonid spawning reaches of blue creek. Blue creek was identified as the highest priority lower klamath watershed for receiving restoration. The project will involve decommissioning a legacy road segment and upgrading three additional road segments to reduce the potential for future large-scale erosion, mass wasting events, and delivery of sediment to productive salmon spawning habitat. This project is part of a comprehensive effort to improve road systems and decommission old roads within the yurok tribe blue creek sanctuary, with the objectives of protecting water quality and native fish while ensuring safe access routes to perform ecological restoration and long-term stewardship of the sanctuary and allow for emergency response in the case of catastrophic wildfires or other incidents. YWRRP will coordinate with yurok fisheries regarding routes allowing access to mainstem blue creek for fisheries restoration purposes. Additionally, the generation of whole tree materials from road and decommissioning work will be donated for fisheries restoration purposes. The project goals are to protect vital anadromous salmonid spawning reaches of blue creek and facilitate instream restoration on the lower blue creek floodplain. Project objectives are to minimize future road-related sedimentation and prevent catastrophic mass wasting events that would deliver fine-grained sediment to the most productive chinook salmon spawning habitat in the entire blue creek watershed. These objectives will be accomplished through the decommissioning of the abandoned B-160 road, a 0.5-mile-long legacy mid-slope road in the B-100 road network that contains six treatment sites that have been identified as having a high risk of failure if left untreated. In addition, road upgrades will be undertaken on the B-700, B-800, and B-830 roads to storm and erosion-proof these road segments, which are critical for future restoration and management of the blue creek sanctuary, as well as tribal fire management. This includes upgrading four miles of road, including installation of rolling dips and replacement of 20 undersized and degraded culverts on steep, non-fish-bearing stream channels with properly sized and armored culverts to minimize the potential for future stream crossing failure. Additional objectives include augmenting restoration of he lower blue creek floodplain by generating whole tree large woody debris that will be delivered to the yurok tribal fisheries departments ongoing lower blue creek restoration project sites.