Fall 1997
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This column is dedicated to the memory of the late, great, San Francisco columnist Herb Caen, who when after telling a friend that he was terminally ill was asked by that same friend, "Do you need anything, Herb?"
"Items," Herb replied. "I need items."
I too need items. If you want this column to reflect the depth and breadth of the events and folks of the wide world of watershed arts and sciences, e-mail me your best tidbits, today at clay_brandow@fire.ca.gov
Herb Caen loved metaphors. Onward to a sea of metaphors.
WMC President Richard Harris writes via email: "Please note the following in Name Stream and Tributaries: Bob Coats has jumped ship from Philip Williams and Associates and now works for Stillwater Sciences in Berkeley, California." Really Richard, "jumped ship" into still water? I'll mix the metaphors 'round here if you don't mind. Seriously though, Bob Coats is an extremely talented and experienced watershed scientist. One of the projects he'll be working on at Stillwater is the Habitat Conservation Plan for the Jackson Demonstration State Forest, a 52,000 acre tract between a between Fort Bragg and Willits, California. Bob can be reached in the environs of Berkeley (510) 848-8098.
WMC President Richard Harris married Angeline Agbisity Pararillo on June 9 and is learning Illocano. Congratulations Richard and Angelinge. May your life together be a pleasure cruise.
Vic Andresen has not jumped ship, but does have a new berth on the battleship Forest Service. Vic was a hydrologist on the Mendocino National Forest in northern California is now hydrologist on the Angeles National Forest in southern California.
Twenty years before the mast....John Rector has just completed twenty-years in the R-5 (California) as Regional Hydrologist for the Pacific Southwest Region of the USDA Forest Service. When Captain Watershed set sail on his Regional xodyssey, the R-5 Best Management Practices (BMP) Handbook did not yet exist nor had the Forest Service been designated by State Water Resource Control Board as the water quality management agency on National Forest lands in California. But John quickly achieved both by commandeering most of the watershed talent then available in the Region. Ever since he's been skillfully sailing the sturdy but heaving 'good ship watershed' through treacherous waters. Following on this successful nonpoint WMC Networker Fall 1997 source pollution control work, Captain Watershed and company produced a BMP effectiveness and implementation monitoring system that is now widely in practice on the national forest lands of California. The Region's BMP program and BMP monitoring system were firsts in the nation, set the model, and are now widely emulated. Along with keeping good ship watershed before the wind, John and others, including WMC member Bruce McCammon are currently finishing a national guidebook for conducting hydrologic assessment of watersheds.
Salmon don't have feet, but it was sure exciting seeing them getting ready to spawn in Clear Creek during the October 17-18, 1997 WMC Field Tour. These big fish have run a 350-mile gauntlet, thorough San Francisco Bay, though the Delta and up the Sacramento River to little old, badly abused Clear Creek. Abuses of Clear Creek run the gamut including, diverting over 80% of the historic flow mostly for power production, past gold dredging, recent past instream gravel mining, hopefully past bad logging and road building practices, and letting fire fuels buildup in the watershed to levels ripe for catastrophic wildfire. Fortunately, something is being done about each of these problems. That's gratifying. As for the two dam dams, a small one six miles upstream from the Sacramento River named Sealtzer and a big one 16-miles upstream from the Sacramento River known as Whiskeytown, the smaller one is being reworked for fish passage and the big one.... Well at least little more of its cool, clear water will be released into lower Clear Creek to help the salmon recover. Many thanks to Steve Borchard of the U.S. Bureau of Land Management and to all the other speakers and organizers of this very successful WMC 1997 field tour.
Get this. Six Rivers National Forest fisheries bio Karen Kenfield placed a gallery of HoboTemp temperature probes in a small tributary to the Trinity River, which flows to the Klamath which flows to the sea just south of Crescent City, CA. One of the HoboTemps could not be recovered during the fall roundup. Oh, well. Losing a few is expected.in wildland monitoring applications. A few months later, the device arrives in the mail. Someone had found it, read the owner's tag and mailed it it to her. They had found it on a beach in Newport Oregon! That's one wonderin' HoboTemp!
Remember, if you've reached a watershed in your career or have an interesting tidbit of watershed news, let your colleagues know about it. Drop a line to Name Stream & Tributaries, c/o Clay Brandow, 1528 Brown Drive, Davis, CA 95616, or call me at (916) 2272663. Internet e-mail finds me at: clay_brandow@fire.ca.gov
