Columbia Land Trust

Looking for a way to connect with nature and give back to your community? Join us and the Oswego Lake Watershed Council for an outdoor volunteer opportunity on Saturday, November 23rd at Beth Ryan Nature Preserve in Lake Oswego!     Several large trees fell across the trail in last winter’s ice storm, creating a newly exposed slope. Together, we will enhance habitat along this local trail by replanting the area with sun-loving wildflowers, grasses, and native Oregon white oak trees!   Register with the Watershed Council at: https://lnkd.in/gkH2ajrc  

Fall colors in the Klickitat River watershed. While monitoring a conserved site before a restoration project begins, our team had the chance to enjoy Oregon white oak trees during their peak colors. Data collected will provide a baseline of habitat quality before our team performs forest thinning to release oak trees, reduce fire fuels, and improve overall forest stand health.

The Cowlitz Indian Tribe and Columbia Land Trust are proud to announce that Kwoneesum Dam, a defunct dam in Skamania County, has been removed, immediately restoring 6.5 miles of fish passage to benefit salmon and steelhead in the Washougal River watershed. This timelapse video shows the deconstruction of the dam itself, which began this spring after nearly 20,000,000 gallons of water were pumped from the 9-acre reservoir and flows diverted from upstream tributaries were temporarily re-routed. The deconstruction process started in May and finished during September of 2024. “The removal of Kwoneesum Dam marks a significant milestone in our journey to restore the natural beauty and ecological balance of our ancestral lands, which in this case has been in the process for many years,” said William Iyall, Cowlitz Indian Tribe Chairman. In addition to the Cowlitz Indian Tribe and Columbia Land Trust, the dam removal was made possible by many other partners and community members, brought together by the goal of restoring fish passage to key spawning habitat and improving a critical natural ecosystem. “Columbia Land Trust is here to deliver conservation that lasts, and that has meaning for the peoples and places where we work,” said Land Trust Executive Director Meg Rutledge. “Being able to collaborate with the Cowlitz Indian Tribe, who always have been and always will be leaders in stewarding and caring for lands and people, is a privilege. The dam removal is the first phase in our shared vision for the restoration of the ecological integrity of this landscape.” We thank all those who supported our vision of environmental stewardship, and we can't wait to see how this landscape evolves over the coming months, years, and beyond, now that natural ecological processes have been restored. Read the full announcement and list of project partners here: https://lnkd.in/gQi2H5DZ

An incredible evening celebrating conservation and community! Nearly 300 people joined us last night for the return of our Wild Splendor gala. We are grateful for the commitment of our #conservation community who came together to make a big difference for the nature of the Northwest! Thank you to everyone who attended and to our amazing sponsors who made this celebration possible. The funds raised will go a long way in enabling us to achieve our ambitious, science-based conservation goals and continue to care for the lands, waters, and wildlife of the Columbia River region. As East Cascades Oak Partnership Manager Lindsay Cornelius said in her remarks, “Community is core to resilience. We remind each other who we are and what we care about. Building a future that we want to live in is not a passive process and Columbia Land Trust cannot do this powerful work without you." Photos by Evan Benally Atwood

Oregon white oak (Quercus garryana) is an iconic species in the East Cascades, supported by the warm, moist air that flows through the Columbia River Gorge. However, oak trees found at the furthest (most extreme) edges of their growing range are more vulnerable to increasingly dry and hot conditions. In collaboration with Cal Poly Humboldt, Oregon State University, and the USDA Natural Resources Conservation Service, the East Cascades Oak Partnership is monitoring specific oak sites to understand how they respond to restoration work in this droughty transition zone. Results will inform restoration strategies for improving the health of these vital oak habitats! Thank you Oregon Department of Forestry and Oregon Watershed Enhancement Board for supporting this important work.

Autumn has arrived! Leaves are falling, wildlife is migrating, and in the Tualatin Valley, Columbia Land Trust is restoring oak habitat by planting thousands of native wildflower bulbs. Great camas, crown brodiaea, white brodiaea, and narrowleaf onion bulbs, all hand-collected by SCHOLLS VALLEY NATIVE NURSERY LLC, made their way into the dirt at Rainbow Natural Area last week. Sowing these bulbs was the first step of this multi-phase restoration project, which will eventually see oak trees, grasses, sedges, shrubs, and even more wildflower bulbs planted at this conserved site along the Tualatin River.

That’s a whole lot of cleaned-up holly! Our stewardship team hosted hardworking volunteers from Holland Partner Group at a conservation easement site in Clark County to remove English holly (Ilex aquifolium). While their leaves may resemble those of Oregon grape, English holly is not a native species. Its roots grow deep into the earth and if removed only at the surface, it can sprout hundreds of new suckers. Holly shrubs can grow up to 50 feet tall and displace other native species in forest understories, which reduces biodiversity. At this conserved site, native plants like orange honeysuckle, Oregon iris, and rare small-flowered trillium (pictured third-fifth) can be found in abundance in nearby areas. Removing non-natives reduces competition for species like these to take hold once again. A big thanks to this group for fearlessly tackling this stubborn holly! Swipe to see the results.

Few things are better than good company, nature talk, and a cold pint on a summer night! Join Columbia Land Trust from 4-6 pm on Friday, August 23rd at Obelisk Beer Co in Astoria, Oregon for our brewery meet-up, Habitap! Obelisk has kindly offered to donate a portion of bar sales to the Land Trust during the event, so know that your purchase will support coastal conservation and restoration, plus a local business. We’ll hear updates from our Coast Region Stewardship Manager, Austin Tomlinson, and offer a warm welcome and introduction to two new members of our local team. Enter our raffle for a chance to win a 2-night cabin stay at the beautiful Trout Creek Wilderness Lodge, or a guided boat tour along the Gray’s River with Austin! As always, these events are free to join and open to all ages, but we’d love if you’d RSVP at https://lnkd.in/gSAqi3JF so we know you’re coming. We hope to see you there! Habitap photo by Doug Gorsline

The removal of Kwoneesum Dam is well underway! Led by the Cowlitz Indian Tribe on land conserved by Columbia Land Trust, this dam removal will restore miles of salmon habitat and improve overall ecosystem health on a key tributary of the Washougal River, within the Cowlitz Indian Tribe’s ancestral lands. The first major step in this process was to remove all the water from the 10-acre reservoir behind the dam. This required temporarily rerouting the flow of water from three tributaries above the reservoir. Rerouting these tributaries while maintaining water quality downstream is one of the most challenging parts of the dam removal process and needed to be done slowly and carefully. Before dewatering of the reservoir began, the Cowlitz Indian Tribe relocated fish and other aquatic species from the downstream waterways that will be dry during deconstruction. Columbia Land Trust, with help from the Xerces Society, salvaged and relocated native freshwater mussels. As of late July, the removal of the 425-foot wide dam structure itself has begun. Once the dam is gone, the Cowlitz Indian Tribe will recreate the braided, meandering nature of the historic tributaries and place logs and large woody structures in the stream beds to create additional fish habitat.

Wetland discoveries from the Columbia River Estuary! Monitoring Program Manager Amy Borde and Land Steward Helen Gavrilov visited our Kandoll Farm site outside Rosburg, Washington to monitor and measure natural processes like sediment accretion, inundation, water temperature, and the size and location of channels within the wetland. The Land Trust began #restoration here in 2005, returning the waterway to its historic path. Our team conducts post-restoration monitoring like this to track the effectiveness of our work. The large wood Amy is standing on is likely quite old and was unearthed during the restoration after being buried for a long time!