Sausal Creek Bank Stabilization

Four years ago Sotoyome RCD staff met with landowners on Sausal Creek for a tailgate meeting to discuss the RCD's Giant Reed (Arundo donax) removal program. The conversation quickly turned to three adjacent landowners voicing their concerns about their failing streambanks that were threatening valuable crop land and winery infrastructure and contributing excessive amounts of sediment into the Steelhead stream below. These concerns are common for landowners throughout the mainstem and tributaries of the Russian River Watershed due in part, to upstream rural residential and agricultural development, and dam releases from Coyote and Warm Springs Dams.

Over the following three years Sotoyome RCD staff worked with the three cooperating landowners, engineering staff on local and state levels from the Natural Resources Conservation Service (NRCS), NOAA National Marine Fisheries Service, Regional Water Quality Control Board, US Army Corps of Engineers, and the Department of Fish and Game, to come up with a comprehensive stream bank repair and re-vegetation plan for all three sites.

NRCS engineering staff provided engineered designs for this complicated project through their Environmental Quality Incentives Program (EQIP). Extensive engineering for this project proved to be quite challenging; problems ranging from highly erosive soil types to high volume water flows. In the summer months of 2007, Sotoyome staff submitted permits and filed California Environmental Quality Act (CEQA) documents on behalf of the landowners involved in the project. After permits were obtained in just four months grading and rock placement were completed in October of 2007. Re-vegetative elements consisted of a live willow wall and other native riparian vegetation planted on the graded side slopes of the stream bank.

Participating landowners on Sausal Creek also participated in the Arundo donax removal program with all treatment sites close to eradication. Although this important project had an extended timeline that tested everyone's patience, the RCD's continued commitment to the landowners and their concerns remained the top priority. If you are a landowner who needs technical assistance or permit assistance for a failing stream bank contact the Sotoyome RCD for help at 707.569.1448.