A01.09_SOW_Sonoma_Bayland.pdf

U.S. ARMY CORPS OF ENGINEERS

SAN FRANCISCO DISTRICT

1455 Market Street, 17th Floor

San Francisco, CA 94103

April 21, 2017

Scope of Work for:

PROJECT: Sonoma Baylands Wetland Demonstration Project

TITLE: 2017 Salt Marsh Harvest Mouse Habitat Assessment

Period of Performance: 4 months from date of award.

MAILING ADDRESS / POINTS OF CONTACT

The point of contact (TPOC) for technical questions at the Corps of Engineers is:

ATTN: CESPN-ET-PA, Eric Jolliffe Environmental Planning A, (Room 1737E) 1455 Market Street, 17th Floor San Francisco, California 94103-1398.

Phone: 415-503-6869 Email: Eric.F.Jolliffe@usace.army.mil

All technical submittals, correspondence, invoices etc shall be emailed directly to the A-E Unit:

ATTN: CESPN-ET-EC, Joseph Viola A-E Services Unit, (Room 1731F) 1455 Market Street, 17th Floor San Francisco, California 94103-1398.

Phone: 415-503-6883 Email: Joseph.J.Viola@usace.army.mil

Sonoma Baylands Wetland Demonstration Project Monitoring 2017 Vegetation Mapping and Salt Marsh Harvest Mouse Habitat Assessment

1.0 Objective of Work

The Sonoma Baylands Wetland Demonstration Project is a 348 acre tidal marsh restoration project in Sonoma County, California, constructed by the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers (Corps), San Francisco District in partnership with the California State Coastal Conservancy (SCC). The project includes a 29 acre pilot unit, which was exposed to tidal action on January 24, 1996, and a 260 acre main unit exposed to tidal action on October 25, 1996. The Corps has been monitoring a variety of physical and biological parameters since breach to provide information on habitat development in accordance with the approved monitoring plan for the project. The purpose of this contract is to determine if the success criterion for salt marsh harvest mouse habitat has been achieved. Habitat will be assessed from aerial photography with ground truthing. A vegetation map will be prepared along with a technical memorandum assessing the overall vegetation cover and salt marsh harvest mouse habitat assessment. The assessment will occur in the mid-summer to ensure that the vegetation is at its full height.

2.0 Description of Work

2.1 Vegetation Mapping and Habitat Assessment.

2.1.1 Task 1 - Vegetation Mapping From Aerial Photos. The contractor will take a series of infrared and color photographs so as to cover the entire restoration site and outboard marsh. Photographs will be taken in the late summer when water level in the site is at its lowest and there is maximum mudflat exposure. The tide level shall be no greater than +2.0 ft MLLW so all vegetation and mudflats are exposed. In addition vegetation will show maximum growth at this time. The photos will be ortho-rectified to NAD83.

The contractor will interpret the photographs using past vegetation maps and aerial photos as reference. The contractor will digitize polygons representing vegetation patches and other biotic habitats, identifying dominant vegetation type for each polygon, over the aerial imagery using ArcGIS or equivalent.

The contractor will conduct field visits to the site to refine the vegetation map. Habitat polygons will be verified and modified if necessary. Polygons representative of the typical visual patterns associated with each habitat type will be verified. Polygons which were not easily distinguishable from other habitat types in the imagery will be visited and identified. Georeferenced photos will be taken during field visits to document the site.

The contractor will finalize the vegetation map based upon the field results and using the georeferenced photos.

Total vegetated area and percent cover by vegetation type will be determined from the vegetation maps. The following protocols will be applied in order to maintain consistency with prior surveys.

All biotic habitats visible in the CIR imagery greater than 100 square feet in size located below the high-tide line will be mapped. The high-tide line will be approximated though visual observation of debris and other physical indicators (e.g., wrack, erosion by wave action).

Biotic habitats with an absolute cover of vegetation greater than or equal to 5% will be mapped as

"vegetated," following the USACE minimum cover requirement to delineate jurisdictional wetlands.

Vegetated habitats will be classified by the plant species with greater than 50% relative cover in the polygon. For example, a polygon with 3% absolute cover of annual pickleweed (Salicornia depressa), 2% absolute cover of perennial pickleweed (Salicornia pacifica), and 95% absolute cover of mudflat would be mapped as "annual pickleweed."

Unvegetated habitats (those with less than 5% absolute cover of vegetation) will be classified as either "pond" or "mudflat."

"Ponds" will be defined as unvegetated areas on the marshplain that retain standing water at low tide.

"Mudflats" will be defined as areas of unconsolidated sediments (e.g., mud), including intertidal flats exposed at low tide, intertidal slough channels, and subtidal habitats.

Nontidal areas will be mapped as either "coyote brush" (Baccharis pilularis) where this upland species is dominant or as "upland," which encompasses all other upland species and habitats above the high-tide line.

Scientific nomenclature used in reporting and mapping will follow The Jepson Manual: Vascular Plants of California, second edition.

Mapping results will be summarized as (1) absolute area of biotic habitats in the Pilot and Main Units and

(2) the percent of the Pilot and Main Units (by area) mapped as vegetated.

2.1.2 Task 2 - Salt Marsh Harvest Mouse Habitat Assessment. Biological Success Criterion No 6 is to provide a minimum of 28 ac of habitat for the salt marsh harvest mouse (Reithrodontymys raviventris) (SMHM) within 20 years from restoration of tidal action. The SMHM relies primarily on tidal salt marshes dominated by perennial pickleweed, which is tall and dense enough to provide cover from predators. Furthermore, these areas need be connected to high salt marsh and ecotone habitats which remain largely above water during high tides to provide refuge from predators and flooding.

The monitoring plan considers suitable habitat to be contiguous areas of at least five acres with a minimum of 80% coverage by pickleweed having an average height of at least 40 cm at the summer maximum of growth.

These areas shall have an overall cover of 100% with a complexity of native halophytes in the form of fat hen (Atriplex triangularis or patula ) and/or alkali heath (Erankenia salina), but not invasive nonnative plant species such as peppergrass (L. epidium latifolium).

The contractor will identify potential SMHM habitat using the vegetation map generated in task 2.1 considering patches of 1 acre or greater with connectivity with adjacent SMHM habitat. Connecting corridors must be dominated by pickleweed and gumplant at an elevation that provides high tide refugia. These corridors will be evaluated in the field. Patch connectivity will be rated as high moderate or low. Patches with less than a 5 acre footprint may be considered habitat if they are significantly connected to identified habitat.

The contractor will investigate patches meeting SMHM habitat criteria in the field. Stratified random sample points will be generated such that 0.1% by area of each patch is covered using a 1m2 quadrat. For each quadrat, the contractor will visually estimate the percent cover. The height of four representative perennial pickleweed stems within the quadrat will be measured along with the tallest stem per patch. Average cover, average height and average maximum height will be calculated for each patch.

Patches identified as SMHM habitat will be delineated on the vegetation map.

2.2 Task 3 - Technical Memorandum

The contractor will prepare a technical memorandum describing the methods and results and findings of the mapping efforts and habitat assessment. The report will include a discussion of the methods, results and findings. A reduced image of the vegetation map will be provided will be provided for reference. The contractor will provide an electronic copy of the draft memo for USACE comment and 20 hard copies of the final memorandum.

Standards for deliverables:

Documents and other written material shall be in proper, standard American English generally conforming to a widely accepted style manual consistent with the product, for example, the Government Printing Office (GPO) or Council of Biological Editors (CBE) style manuals.

USACE will do an initial screening to determine if each deliverable satisfactorily meets contractual requirements. If criteria are met, a full review will commence. Otherwise, the USACE, without providing a full review or complete comments, will so inform the contractor who shall revise and resubmit the documents for a subsequent screening at no additional cost to the Government.

All material and communication shall remain strictly confidential and shall not be released without written permission (may be by email) from the Contracting Officer.

Requirements for Geospatial Data

1. Geospatial data are defined as information that identifies the geographic location and characteristics of natural or constructed features and boundaries on the earth. Geospatial data affected by these requirements are those generated in a: Geographic Information System (GIS); Land Information System (LIS); Remote Sensing or Image Processing system; Computer-Aided Design and Drafting (CADD) system; Automated Mapping/Facilities Management (AM/FM) system; and other computer system that employs or references data using either absolute, relative, or assumed coordinates. Compatible formats include:

-ESRI shapefiles or geodatabase feature classes -Microsoft Excel Spreadsheets -Microsoft Access Databases -CADD vector drawing files -Comma-delimited text files (ASCII text) -Raster data in ESRI Grids, .tif, .tiff, .jpg, .jp2, .img, .sid with accompanying world files.

2. All deliverables, including drawings, graphics, and documents, must include all geospatial data files, geodatabases, layer files (such as .lyr) and map files (such as .mxd) developed for the deliverable; a .pdf or image depicting geospatial data is not considered a complete deliverable.

3. All vector GIS data is required to be compliant with Spatial Data Standard for Facilities, Infrastructure, and Environment (SDSFIE) Version 3.1 USACE HQ 3.1 adaptation or later versions. Guidelines are available at http://www.sdsfieonline.org/ . Spatial Data Standards define the nomenclature of the feature datasets, feature classes, and attribution of all vector features stored within the geodatabase. The GIS manager/coordinator can provide assistance with the US Army Corps of Engineers implementation guidance for SDSFIE and help with providing and using empty SDSFIE compliant geodatabases for contractors performing GIS tasks. Additional requirements for the specific types of GIS data are outlined below.

a. Sediment sampling data collection within the jurisdiction of the San Francisco Dredged

Material Management Office shall comply with DMMO reporting guidelines and templates described at http://dmmosfbay.org/ . Sediment sampling data collection outside the jurisdiction of the DMMO shall comply with templates and formatting guidance provided on the San Francisco District eCoastal GIS website.

http://www.spn.usace.army.mil/Missions/Surveys,StudiesStrategy/eCoastalGIS.aspx

b. Vegetation mapping shall comply with the United States National Vegetation

Classification (NVC) described at http://usnvc.org/. Vegetation mapping that incorporates other classification systems should include an explanation of how the data corresponds to the NVC (e.g. provide a list of map unit categories used in the deliverable and how they match up to the NVC categories).

4. All spatial data will be geo-referenced and provided in a standard projection, as described below. The GIS manager/coordinator should approve the projection standard.

Preferred Coordinate Systems Datum: North American Datum 1983 (NAD 83) Survey Epoch: 2009.00 or later Spheroid: GRS 1980 Units: Decimal degrees

OR

Datum: World Geodetic System 1984 (WGS 84) Spheroid: WGS 1984 Units: Decimal degrees

Preferred Projection Projection: NAD 83 California State Plane Coordinate System Zone III Datum: North American Datum 1983 Spheroid: GRS 1980 Units: US Survey Feet

OR

Projection: Universal Transverse Mercator (UTM) Zone III Datum: North American Datum 1983 Spheroid: GRS 1980 Units: Meters

Required Vertical Datum Vertical Reference Datum: North American Vertical Datum of 1988 (NAVD 88) Tidal Datum: Mean Lower Low Water (MLLW) Tidal Epoch: National Tidal Datum Epoch - 1983-2001 or most recent Geoid Model: GEOID09 or most recent Units: US Survey Feet Horizontal Reference Datum: NAD83 Survey Epoch: 2009.00 or later

5. All deliverables will include metadata compliant with the Federal Geographic Data Committee (FGDC) standards.

See the accompanying reference document titled: Metadata Quick Guide (April 2006 Vers.).

The FGDC metadata standard is also described here: http://www.fgdc.gov/metadata/csdgm-new

6. A copy of the completed and verified data should be delivered via CD-ROM or compressed zip file to the

GIS manager/coordinator. All digital and hardcopy project data and information must be delivered including GIS vector data, georeferenced raster data, FGDC compliant metadata, and other non-spatial supporting materials.

3.0 Invoice and Payment

Invoices shall be submitted through email to:

Attn: Joseph Viola, A-E Unit U.S. Army Corps of Engineers 1455 Market St. Suite 1731F San Francisco, CA 94103 Tel. No. 415-503-6883 Email: Joseph.J.Vioal@usace.army.mil

4.0 Pre-screen candidates using E-Verify Program.

The Contractor must pre-screen Candidates using the E-verify Program (http://www.uscis.gov/e-verify) website to meet the established employment eligibility requirements. The Vendor must ensure that the Candidate has two valid forms of Government issued identification prior to enrollment to ensure the correct information is entered into the E-verify system. An initial list of verified/eligible Candidates must be provided to the COR no later than 3 business days after the initial contract award. *When contracts are with individuals, the individuals will be required to complete a Form I-9, Employment Eligibility Verification, with the designated Government representative. This Form will be provided to the Contracting Officer and shall become part of the official contract file.

5.0 Proposal: The contractor’s proposal shall be detailed enough to show cost associated with each task outlined above and each subtasks outlined in the pricing schedule. The level of detail in the cost proposal shall be sufficient to estimate percentages completed and activities completed to justify progress payments.