Monitoring Steelhead Production and Habitat Restoration in the Potlatch River Drainage, Idaho

The Potlatch River drainage contains a substantial wild steelhead population and is the largest tributary within the Lower Clearwater River major population group. The drainage has been severely impacted by changes in land use and manipulation of habitat over the past 100 years. The alterations have resulted in two significant limiting factors within the drainage: 1) lack of late summer streamflow in the lower drainage and 2) lack of instream complexity in the upper drainage. The Intensively Monitored Watershed project provides effectiveness monitoring for habitat restoration projects addressing limiting factors within the Potlatch River watershed. Two index tributaries, Big Bear Creek and East Fork Potlatch River are before/after fish in/fish out monitoring tributaries.  In addition, juvenile steelhead productivity by way of density and growth data is monitored in a Before-After Control-Impact design within treatment and control reaches. Overall steelhead production of both juveniles and adults has been highly variable in both the upper and lower drainages. Pre-treatment fish in/fish out monitoring has shown density dependent relationships in juvenile recruits per female spawner productivity. The suite of habitat restoration approaches currently being implemented are focused towards reducing the density dependent effects observed within the drainages.