Field Trips

Listed below is the list of field trip opportunities for this year's conference. 

All trips are scheduled to depart at 8AM from Tulalip Resort parking lot and are considered full day unless otherwise noted.  Field trips are $50 per person, including lunch.

FT-1.  Skagit Delta Restoration

Field Trip Leader: Kat Morgan 

Full day trip. The Nature Conservancy will show several types of projects in this area including:  Farming for Wildlife (an innovative crop rotation project that provides temporary wetland habitat for waterbirds and soil health benefits for farmers), and the Fisher Slough restoration project (lower floodplain freshwater tidal marsh restoration project that provides multiple benefits including flood storage, improved fish passage, and additional juvenile Chinook rearing habitat). Washington Dept. of Fish and Wildlife will show dike setbacks in brackish areas.  The Skagit Delta is also an excellent area to see over-wintering waterfowl; along the way we will stop to see large flocks of snow geese and swans.  If there is time, participants will see an area of successfully controlled Spartina anglica, a marine invasive plant that has threatened the mudflat habitats of the area.   Participants driving north after the conference can meet on site with their personal vehicle. Trip Leader:  Kat Morgan

FT-2.  Puget Sound Beach Restoration and Snohomish Delta Restoration

Field Trip Leader: Jon Houghton

Full day trip. The Port of Everett will show its “beach augmentation” project where it has added sand and gravel offshore a railroad retaining wall that was built into the tidal zone 100-years ago.  The trip will also view the 350-acre Qwuloolt project, where the Tulalip Tribe is restoring a critical tidal wetland in the Snohomish River estuary in a formerly diked area.  Historically, the area was composed of tidal marsh and forest scrub-shrub habitats, interlaced by tidal channels, mudflats, and streams. Other sites that will be visited include: the 19-acre Port of Everett Union Slough Saltmarsh Mitigation Project; the 300-acre Port of Everett Blue Heron Slough restoration on Spencer Island where channels between the dikes and excavated material used for islands will have more edge habitat than natural mud flats within the dikes; the 93-acre City of Everett Smith Island Union Slough restoration; the 486-acre Snohomish County Smith Island Estuary Restoration site; the 400-acre WDFW/Snohomish County Spencer Island restoration; and the site of the 1237-acre WDFW Ebey Island Wildlife Area with a description of its restoration potential and problems.  

FT-4.  River Restoration.  Large Woody material Installation and Slough Reconnection

Field Trip Leader: Pat Stevenson

Full day trip.  The Stillaguamish Tribe will show the Hazel Hole log jams in the North Fork Stillaguamish River, designed both to provide wood habitat features in the main stem and to steer part of the flow into a side channel.  The Tribe will also show the 1100-foot long log revetment designed to stabilize the landslide at Steelhead Haven.  The trip will also visit the North Meander and Blue Slough projects, where formerly abandoned channels of the Stillaguamish River main stem have been/will be rehydrated with part of the river’s flow to provide off channel salmon habitat.  Trip Leader:  Pat Stevenson

FT-7.  Urban Restoration in Seattle (Full Day)

Field Trip Leader: Dave McDonald

Full day trip.  This trip will view techniques designed to manage stormwater, and restore other ecosystem functions in an urban or developing area, including:

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