Restoring Trout Habitat in a Landscape of Western Abandoned Mines

According to the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), abandoned hard rock mines affect 40 percent of headwaters in the western United States.  The tens of thousands of abandoned mines and tailings piles are the residue of 150 years of hard rock mining under an antiquated system that encouraged minerals development but left little in the way of environmental protection.  In 2003, Trout Unlimited launched a campaign to address this long standing legacy of mining impacts and initiated clean-up efforts at sites in Idaho, Colorado, Utah and Montana. 

Working with the Forest Service, Bureau of Land Management, state agencies and conservation partners, TU staff have spearheaded varied mine cleanup projects in the last decade. By treating water quality from draining adits, removing mine tailings, and improve fish passage, floodplain connectivity, and suppressed vegetation communities,  these restoration and reclamation project have targeted sensitive native trout species such as westslope cutthroat, bull trout, redband rainbow trout, as well as numerous other aquatic organisms.   

Besides describing the legal, funding and partnership mechanisms used to complete these projects, this presentation will put an extra emphasis on the habitat and water quality issues created by historic dredge mines in Idaho and Montana.  Dredge, hydraulic and placer mining was ubiquitous throughout the western U.S in the early twentieth century and has affected thousands of miles of streams.  While a draining mine adit is considered the “poster child” of abandoned mineland issues, these placer sites continue to present unique challenges to land managers and others in interested in fisheries and stream restoration.  TU staff Pam Elkovich and Rob Roberts will describe their successes and lessons learned while trying to address these enduring scars on the landscape.