The National Fish Habitat Partnership released its 2019 Annual Report highlighting progress on its mission to “protect, restore, and enhance the nation’s fish and aquatic communities through partnerships that foster fish habitat conservation and improve the quality of life for the American people.” Through the National Fish Habitat Partnership program, the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service and its partners provided more than $18 million to support 83 fish habitat conservation projects in 34 states. The Service provided $4 million in 2019, with state resource agencies, non-governmental organizations, and other partners contributing an additional $14 million. read the report here.

Evan Hayduk, Coordinator of the MidCoast Watersheds Council, was recently awarded the prestigious American Fisheries Society Rising Star Award, which recognizes outstanding early-career contributions in fish habitat conservation. Hayduk recieved a masters degree from the Evergreen State College in 2012 and since 2016 has worked with the Watersheds Council to restore fish habitat. He has overseen several large projects such as the North Creek Culvert Replacement, which restored over 13 miles of habitat with old growth forest for Chinook, coho, sea-run cutthroat trout, steelhead, and lamprey and the Yaquina Estuary Tidal Wetland Restoration project, which is currently under construction and will enhance 20 acres of tidal marsh habitat benefiting Chinook and coho. All Hayduk’s work focuses on restoring ecological processes that sustain the clean water and diverse habitats necessary for salmon and other fish and wildlife.

The award comes with $250 prize money to be provided to a Fish Habitat Partnership of the winner’s choice. PMEP has supported the MidCoast Watershed Council’s Yaquina Estuary Tidal Wetland Restoration Project and so Hayduk chose PMEP to receive the prize money.

The Pacific Marine and Estuarine Fish Habitat Partnership (PMEP) is partnering with the Friends of South Slough Reserve to develop a synthesis of eelgrass restoration techniques along the U.S. West Coast to inform the restoration community, promote successful restoration of eelgrass, and provide greater clarity regarding the conditions where mitigation would (and conversely would not) be an appropriate intervention as opposed to other management strategies.

This Request for Proposals seeks to identify a contractor to complete this synthesis and report. The work will include compiling and synthesizing restoration and mitigation techniques, successes, and failures along the U.S. West Coast through literature reviews and interviews with restoration practitioners and researchers.

The Request for Proposals can be accessed here.

How to Respond

Please read the full Request for Proposals for instructions regarding what information to include and the preferred format for information. Incomplete or late proposals will not be considered. The deadline for proposals submissions is Friday, July 31, 2020 at 5:00PM PDT.

PMEP is pleased to announce the following projects have been selected for funding through the National Fish Habitat Partnership.  These projects represent important conservation priorities of PMEP.  $192,817 has been awarded to the partnership through the Fish and Aquatic Conservation Program of the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service for the following five projects:

• Seestrom Tidelands Restoration Project
• Columbia-Pacific Passage, Hungry Harbor Restoration
• Neskowin Fish Passage Improvement Project
• Enhancement of Olympia oysters to provide heterogeneous habitat for fish and invertebrates
• A regional scale assessment of fish habitat along the nearshore of greater Puget Sound

Read more about these and other PMEP funded project here.

PMEP-supported Bear River Estuary Restoration is included in the National Fish Habitat Partnership list of “Waters to Watch” for 2020. This annual list represents a collection of strategic conservation efforts implemented on rivers, streams, estuaries, and lakes to protect, restore, or enhance fish habitat. These voluntary, locally-driven projects represent some of the top conservation activities completed or in progress by 20 regionally-based Fish Habitat Partnerships throughout the country. These projects are carried out under the goals and objectives of the 2012  National Fish Habitat Action Plan. These conservation projects conserve freshwater, estuarine, and marine habitats essential to many fish and wildlife species. These activities are fundamental to the overall success of the National Fish Habitat Partnership that was established in 2006.

“The projects, which focus on the protection, restoration, and enhancement of fish habitats across the country, are a sampling of the top priorities of our partnerships,” said Ed Schriever, Chair of the National Fish Habitat Board. “The Waters to Watch campaign provides people an opportunity to learn about our projects in a more in-depth way, which exemplifies collaborative conservation involving many partners.”

The 2020 “Waters to Watch” list and associated Fish Habitat Partnerships

1. Bear River Estuary, Washington (Retrospective) – Pacific Marine and Estuarine Partnership
2. Boone River Watershed, Iowa (Retrospective) – Fishers and Farmers Partnership
3. Chipola River, Florida (Retrospective) – Southeast Aquatic Resources Partnership
4. Deep Creek Town Diversion and Warner Basin, Oregon (Retrospective) – Western Native Trout Initiative
5. Maunalua Bay, Hawai’i – Hawai’i Fish Habitat Partnership
6. Minsi Lake, Pennsylvania – Reservoir Fish Habitat Partnership
7. San Juan and Santiago Watersheds, California – California Fish Passage Forum
8. San Luis Obispo Creek, California – Pacific Lamprey Conservation Initiative
9. Shoshone Springs, California (Retrospective) – Desert Fish Habitat Partnership
10. Tularosa River, New Mexico – Desert Fish Habitat Partnership

PMEP welcomes Bree Yednock, Reserve Manager at the South Slough National Estuarine Research Reserve (NERR), to its Steering Committee. Bree has been the Reserve Manager at the South Slough NERR since 2018 after serving as the Reserve’s Lead Scientist and Research Coordinator for four years. Before coming to the reserve, she worked for more than 15 years in the fields of science education and research at various non-profits, academic institutions, and agencies in Oregon, Maryland, Georgia, Maine, and Washington. Her research background ranges from field ecology to molecular biology and includes projects related to population genetics of fishery species, environmental adaptation in marine organisms, and estuarine habitat use of fish and invertebrates. She holds a PhD in Environmental and Evolutionary Biology from the University of Louisiana, a MS in Coastal Marine and Wetland Studies from Coastal Carolina University, and a BA in Environmental Studies from the University of Oregon.

PMEP welcomes Stephanie Messerle, from the Bureau of Land Management, onto our Steering Committee. Stephanie will represent BLM on PMEP, facilitating the sharing of data and support for fish habitat restoration and protection on BLM lands along the US West Coast. Stephanie is the District Fish Biologist for the Coos Bay Bureau of Land Management, located along the Oregon Coast. Prior to joining the Coos Bay District in 2007, Stephanie was a fish biologist for the Medford BLM. She also has worked for the Oregon Department of Fish and Wildlife and the National Park Service’s Biological Resource Division in Utah. Stephanie received a Bachelor of Science Degree in Environmental Science/Biology from Southern Oregon University. Stephanie grew up on the Southern Oregon Coast and is so happy to live there now. Outside of work she stays busy with her two sons and husband enjoying outdoor recreation activities and exploring the beautiful Pacific Northwest.

PMEP partners met in Arcata, California in late January to develop their annual workplan, refine PMEP’s strategic plan, learn about local restoration projects and affirm their’ shared vision for healthy estuarine and marine nearshore fish habitat along the West Coast. We also gave John Bragg, of South Slough National Research Reserve, a special sendoff, thanking him for his years of service to PMEP. Thanks again, John! Enjoy your retirement!

PMEP is expanding its spatial data framework to include nearshore areas and developing a ‘State of the Knowledge’ report on West Coast nearshore habitats.

PMEP is seeking spatially interpreted data (in either vector or raster format) identifying nearshore fish and invertebrate habitats (substrate, biotic, and water column component). We are placing a priority on datasets with a large spatial footprint that consistently map a habitat feature or features for large segments of the coast (preferably 10’s to 100’s of kilometers). For this project, PMEP is identifying the core nearshore as the upper end of the splash zone to -30m depth. In addition, PMEP is requesting data that extends beyond -30m to -100 (Seaward Zone) since many nearshore fish and invertebrates use habitats deeper than -30m. We are not currently looking for data from estuaries, however, we are looking for data for the nearshore of Puget Sound while recognizing that the Sound itself is classified as an estuary. For a full description of this request and a list of datasets already in hand, see PMEP_NearshoreDataCall.

If you would like to contribute to this effort, contact PMEP Data Steward, Kate Sherman, at info@pacificfishhabitat.org or 503-595-3100 by January 31, 2020.

The Pacific Marine & Estuarine Fish Habitat Partnership (PMEP) is pleased to announce its FY2019 funded projects. The three projects, Eelgrass Expansion in the Morro Bay Estuary, Assessment and mapping of seagrass and macroalgae kelp habitats, and Mattole River Estuary Middle Slough Restoration, represent important conservation priorities of PMEP.  The projects have been selected for funding through the National Fish Habitat Partnership. $124,118 has been awarded to PMEP to fund these projects through the Fish and Aquatic Conservation Program of the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service for the following three projects. Read more about these projects at here.