Restoring a riparian zone

[gouch]

I should clarify I know nothing about the site, but I do have lots of direct experience in management within riparian areas including restorations.

That fuels my it ain't that simple take, IMO worth talking to pros rather than reacting with what seems to be scorn regarding the perceived stupidity or recovery efforts.

In my case, I have seen multiple situations where active management is far preferable to doing nothing, and that may well not be visible or understandable without some context to the average person.

Just some examples--doing nothing where invasives have taken hold after a major disturbance--a pretty common thing--can make an invasive problem far worse. They move down stream pretty readily--doesn't take long before you can have miles long infestations.

And in some places while it defies many expectations the fisheries pros tell us some trees and shrubs make erosion and bank stability issues worse than restoring to deep rooted forbs and grasses.

For cool water trout streams long lived species that provide shade are preferable if the stream is prone to warming without them, and species favored by beavers can be highly discouraged as well.

Just a few things that come to mind, again not sure if they apply in this situation.

You are right about the scorn for perceived stupidity in the recovery efforts. I should be ashamed. I guess you could say it is kind of an inside joke that nobody except maybe @Lassio Cravensworth, or whatever he's calling himself, would get.

You see, this riparian zone is in fact a greenway connecting five communities along Bear Creek within the Rogue Valley. It is a couple to a few hundred feet wide semi-natural strip of land along Bear Creek surrounded by rural or agricultural development and with a paved bike path running its length. The stretch in my story is between the towns of Ashland and Talent. The people living in Ashland in particular and more and more the people in Talent. are stereotyped by the rest of the region as Ultra Liberal, tree hugging, Subaru driving, affluent hippies. Probably not fair but if you lived around here you would know.

The aggressive approach with the re-routing the creek, the thousands of little flags and the informational signage and all that's going on just fits so perfectly into how we perceive the way that these people think when it comes to interacting with nature. So, I role my eyes and make fun.

There is actually a very comprehensive well thought out plan for managing the greenway and addressing the invasive species problem, that was adopted just months before the fire. I think the fire just rattled everyone a bit.

 

[Bullshot]

Pin flags are bad. Even worse are the thousands of derelict plastic tree tubes that are left to rot (or not) in place for decades, and all the other associated deer fencing, goose netting, tree supports, wires, rubber tubing, tree tags, surveyors tapes, etc that are almost always left untended after “mitigation” projects are completed. I’m a consultant that sometimes has to do prelim
research or get permits for such projects. People can be so dumb. And there is far more money than sense out there. That said… a really well done mitigation project can be awesome… but they are so few and so far between.

 

[Hydrophilic]

Without knowing the full background...that sounds frustrating.

I like live stakes. OP mentioned willow and cottonwood. All ya do it take a bunch of 2 foot branch cuttings from nearby plants in the winter and put them half way in the soil where you want a plant. Mark them with some flagging so you can find them in the coming years. Focus volunteer efforts on keeping the blackberries down until those plantings become established and they will shade out a lot of the blackberry over time. I have some willow I live stacked a couple years ago that is 15 feet tall already.

I've done this with snowberry and have an interesting observation. I planted a 5 gallon snowberry from a nursery around 5 years ago at our place. It's grown some, still hasn't flowered. I've done some live stakes in the same spot from snowberry that grows on our property and they went from a single sprig to almost as big as the 5 gallon nursery plant in 3 years - plus they flower profusely and send out rhizomes / shoots all over. I think that says plant sourcing and materials matter...and I wonder how many projects have completely failed because they use poor materials.