Stream Temperatures - Riparian Study

Watershed Research Cooperative
OSU Forest Research Laboratory
Michael Newton

2004 Annual Report

During the second year of this study, key activities have included:

• Installation of Big Rock Creek study on Boise land, west of Monmouth in the mid-Coast Range. Large type F stream of low gradient. Completed inventory of riparian stand, pre-harvest stream structural features and log inventory, and two years of pre-harvest stream temperatures. Unit scheduled for logging winter 2004-5.

• Completed harvest on Brome Creek, near Hinkle Creek. and West Fork, Mary's River. Post-harvest stream temperatures being collected summer 2004, along with post-harvest re-inventory of timber in both buffers and stream structure. Data presently being evaluated.

• Working on method for determination of temperature response to change in streamside cover with different buffer designs, based on time-series regressions of daily mean temperatures of water entering a unit and leaving a unit, based on recorded temperatures from June to late September.

• Fourth stream is installed, Mill Creek, on Plum Creek land near Toledo , OR . First year of temperature recorders is currently in place.

• Three of the four streams have had fisheye photos taken at intervals of 100 feet for determination of canopy geometry with respect to radiation.

• Radiation measurements are in progress in which a representative sample of photo points is being calibrated with net radiometers simultaneously with radiation measurements in clearcuts. This is an attempt to calibrate photos to reflect net radiation instead of canopy opening, and allows adjustment of photo interpretations to allow for outgoing radiation.

• For Brome Creek and Mary's River, established that a high correlation exists between air temperature and water temperature.

• The Oregon Department of Fish and Wildlife has PIT tagged over 200 cutthroat trout in Brome Creek to determine if their movements will provide evidence of whether changes in streamside cover lead to changes in fish use. Tracking surveys of the fish indicate they do not live long, but they do not move around very much. These data will help design sampling protocols for labeling and recapture of fish within specific treatment reaches for estimation of effect of streamside cover on stream productivity and fish growth. We also have collected benthic data and initial electroshocking fish data for Big Rock Creek and Mary's River.

• A paper submitted to the Symposium on Forest Productivity at Shelton , WA has been accepted for publication, under the title, “L inkage between riparian buffer features and regeneration, benthic communities and water temperature in headwaters streams, western Oregon . ” Authors are Michael Newton and Elizabeth C. Cole, to be published in a USDA General Technical Report. This paper summarizes six years of experimental data describing responses of stream temperature, benthic insects and conifer regeneration to buffer design.

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