Idaho Screen Program2006 Update

Present Status• Most major river corridors have been treated

by diversion consolidations, ditch eliminations, passage improvements, water conservation, and screening.

• After a three year BPA funding cycle of being restricted to only installing screens and fish passage, we are returning to a tributary wide treatment approach.

• Moratorium on new water rights was lifted.

Tributary Focus

• Spawning streams for wild steelhead

• Spawning streams for Bull Trout and Westslope Cutthroat Trout

• Anadromous juvenile rearing streams

• Provide late summer thermal refuge

• Vital life component for fluvial trout

• Provide flushing flows downstream

Annual Counts of Fluvial Bull Trout Redds counted in Fourth of July Creek (SNRA) from 2003-2006

(Curet/Murphy).

16

41

71

33

0

10

20

30

40

50

60

70

80

2003 2004 2005 2006

Year of Redd Survey

# o

f Bu

ll T

rou

t Re

dd

s

Bull TroutRedds

33

Monitoring & Evaluation• Stream Surveys• PIT Tag Interrogations• Weir operations• Redd counts

Recent Evaluations

• 30+ Stream Surveys. • Alaska Steeppass ladder evaluation on

the SChaC-08/8A diversion.• PIT tag interrogators on lower Lemhi

River fish screen bypasses.• Hydraulic and fisheries evaluations on

every newly deployed structure. • Limited evaluation of the Gooby

Bubbler screen using rainbow fry.

R & D Program• Twin rotating cylinder solar powered screen with a

four inch bottle brush cleaner. Attaches directly to a pipeline.

• Paddlewheel operated horizontal traveling belt screen.

• Double bay concrete paddlewheel driven point of diversion wiper screen.

• Additional paddlewheel design work involving dimensional analysis.

FRIMA Work

• Mahala Ditch project near McCall, Idaho.

• Two rotary drum screens in the Bear River drainage in Southeast, Idaho.

• Currently working on a Panther Creek ditch consolidation project with the local Model Watershed program.

Squaw CreekScreens and Passage

• Installed fish screens on all six diversions.

• Improved fish passage at two diversions.

• Eliminated problems with wolves and researchers.

Kenny Creek Reconnection Project

Concerns

• IDWR enforcement of water rights.• Federal land management agency action

response times.• Cost share availability for Federal funding.• High cost to conserve water. • Absentee landowners.• Subdivided lands & multiple irrigators.

Outlook• Conservation groups such as Nature Conservancy,

Friends of the Tetons, and Trout Unlimited are energizing locals in SE Idaho to participate in fisheries projects.

• Growing group that believe “Any screen is better than no screen.”

• Farm Bill grows larger each year and has more funding for conservation including fish screens.

• Cabela’s in Boise. Demographics are changing. More interest in conservation.