Proposal to the Resource Advisory Committee, for the January 14, 2010 Meeting

Cal explained the project to Gina Knudsen  on December 16, 2009,  at the Salmon Valley Stewardship office.  Next step is to discuss the project with Lemhi County Forest Restoration Group.

This message went out on December 16, 2009:

Salmon Municipal Watershed - Pls respond by Thurs 10 a.m.

Dear Lemhi County Forest Restoration Group members, 

Those of you who have an interest in the Salmon Municipal Watershed … Lemhi County citizen Cal Leman discussed with me his idea to request Central Idaho RAC funds to have a qualified contractor conduct an inventory in approx 12,000 acres of the watershed to characterize the landscape as it relates to vegetation characteristics, fuel loading, and fire hazard with the intent of determining management needs.

He would like collaborative support of the project to enable SVS to request funding on the collaborative's behalf. After speaking with North Wind Environmental about a project they did for the BLM in Eastern Idaho , he believes the work could be contracted for roughly $20,000. The intent would not be to replace our priority project of Upper North Fork , but simply to gather data that better informs future decisions.

 The first due date for Central Idaho RAC projects is Jan 14 so I’m asking for a short notice conference call lasting 30-45 minutes. If you are interested please indicate your availability on this web calendar tool: 

The link to your poll is: 

http://www.doodle.com/83ax6di2bibcr7n3

Another link is to a website Cal put together: http://votingpeoplehelpingpeople.com/Jesse_Creek/Proposal_RAC.html

Thank you!

Gina Knudson

Salmon Valley Stewardship

208-756-1686

salmonvalley@centurytel.net

www.salmonvalley.org

Time of Call

We’ll have the call on Monday, Dec 21 @ 11 a.m.

Wayne Talmadge has reserved the Salmon Valley Business and Innovation Center board room for those of you who are in town and would like to join the call there. Those interested in calling in can do so by calling the number we sent to you.

Overview of the Project

The Salmon Municipal Watershed (SMW) narrowly escaped burning in the 2000 fire.  This proposal addresses this fire risk.

Jesse Creek, Chipps Creek, and Pollard Canyon are the forest areas and the sagebrush-bunchgrass areas that are in the 12,000 acres of the SMW.  

Figure 1 SMW vicinity.[i]

Figure 2 The SMW

This watershed is at increasing risk of severe wildfires, because of a century of fire exclusion.  Prevailing westerly winds could drive a lightning-ignited fire down the mountain through the mixed-conifers to Salmon.  On a windless day, a spark from a barbeque in late summer could start a fire that rushes up the mountain through the sagebrush and bunchgrass into the mixed-confers.

The objectives of the Salmon Municipal Watershed Plan of 1975 are to provide maximum watershed protection to produce high-quality water, without impairing the other resource values of the area. 

None of these objectives has been addressed by private or by agency action. 

This proposal addresses these objectives.

We propose to map and treat Strategically Placed Area Treatments (SPLATs).[ii] These SPLATs are areas of the SMW, from 20 to 200 acres, where we treat vegetation to reduce fuel loading and to modify stand and canopy structure.  This three-step project will (1) inventory the watershed, (2) complete NEPA for the areas the inventory shows should be treated, (3) treat the areas.

Figure 3.  An example of area treatments to interrupt fire spread and modifies fire behavior. The winds in this example are from the south and southwest. The lines show that the head of a spreading fire would be continuously forced to flank around treatments, causing lower rates of spread and intensity because the fire is interrupted.[iii]

The SMW SPLATs calculated by Bill Baer for SMW are:

The use of these SPLATs is limited because the conditions on the ground were unknown.