EPA looking at Coal Creek problem

Hungry Horse News

The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency is heading up an investigation into why bull trout populations are not recovering in Coal Creek, a tributary of the North Fork. Bull trout are listed as threatened under the Endangered Species Act.

Unlike in other North Fork tributaries, the number of bull trout spawning beds in Coal Creek-redds-has not recovered from a region-wide collapse in bull trout populations. The collapse was blamed on the introduction of mysis shrimp in the Flathead River system by the state between 1965 and 1975.

The number of redds in Coal Creek dropped from 34 in 1980, when fisheries biologists began counting, to zero in 2001 and three in 2004. By comparison, the 2004 numbers for Big, Whale and Trail creeks are 11, 41 and 34.

"Historically, the Coal Creek watershed supported one of the most productive bull trout populations in the Flathead River watershed," the EPA reported Sept. 24 in a draft water quality report on headwaters tributaries in the Flathead.

An explanation for why bull trout populations in Coal Creek have failed to rebound has not been found, the EPA concluded, but possible factors include the amount of large woody debris, pools and barriers in the creek, stream temperature, and the amount of sediment coming from natural sources, like eroding banks or areas burned by the 2001 Moose Fire, or man-made sources, like timber sales, roads and channelization.

"Overall, there appears to be very few current (man-made) sources of sediment in the Coal Creek watershed," the EPA concluded. "However, current sediment sources may not be the source of the high percentage of fine substrate material observed in Coal Creek. Historical sources, such as roads, road building and harvests, may have contributed much more sediment in the past than is currently observed today."

EPA project manager Ron Steg said the federal agency got involved in the Flathead headwaters to help the state Department of Environmental Quality deal with a large number of water quality investigations stemming from a lawsuit brought against the DEQ by Friends of the Wild Swan.

Friends of the Wild Swan sued the DEQ in the 1990s, alleging the agency was dragging its feet in establishing "total maximum daily load" limits for streams identified as impaired under Section 303 of the federal Clean Water Act, Steg said. The "303" list is updated every two years, he said.

In a September 2000 court ruling, the DEQ was ordered to have TMDLs established for all streams on the 1996 Section 303 list by May 5, 2007, Steg said. The EPA appealed and lost, but an agreement was reached with Friends of the Wild Swan extending the deadline to 2012, he said. U.S. District Judge Donald Molloy has yet to rule on that agreement, Steg said.

Steg said setting TMDLs for the watersheds will not limit natural resource use in the future.

"The Forest Service can not allow logging that impairs water quality," he said. "We're focused on current water quality degradation."

The Hungry Horse Reservoir and 12 stream segments in the headwaters of the Flathead are on the 1996 list, including Coal, Big, Whale and Red Meadow creeks in the North Fork. Coal Creek, a focus of the investigation, is divided into three segments:

* The South Fork of Coal Creek was placed on the 1996 list because of siltation, habitat alteration and riparian degradation, but "overall, it appears that siltation is not impairing" fish populations there, the EPA report said.

The last recorded fire in the South Fork of Coal Creek was in 1910, and although 743 acres had been logged in the drainage since 1955, none had been clear-cut since 1991. Road density in the drainage was considered low, and almost all the roads were closed yearlong, the EPA said, but heavy equipment operation in the Mathias Creek area and channelization of portions of the South Fork during past logging activities could be contributing sediment.

* The North Fork of Coal Creek was included in the 1996 list because of siltation and nutrients, but increasing numbers of westslope cutthroat trout and a healthy macroinvertebrate population indicated siltation and nutrients were not harming the fishery, the report said.

The last fire in the North Fork of Coal Creek burned 100 acres in 1988. Since 1960, about 6 percent of the drainage was clear-cut, the last being about 125 acres in 1990. A recent Forest Service survey found plugged culverts, sediment slumps and actively eroding surfaces on Roads 5270 and 5278.

* The situation in Lower Coal Creek is significantly different. The stream segment was included in the 2002 "303" listing by the DEQ because of "sedimentation, embeddedness, bank erosion and logging activities," the EPA reported, and while the macroinvertebrate population there was not impaired, the cold-water fishery was.

"We've seen some natural channelization there," said Forest Service soil scientist Dean Sirucek. "It's a relatively flat and sensitive area. The type of material found there does not hold together well."

Almost 30 percent of the Lower Coal Creek drainage burned in the Moose Fire - nearly 15,000 acres - mostly from Dead Horse Creek downstream to the North Fork of the Flathead. Forest Service soil scientists predicted as much as 3.6 tons of sediment per acre would wash down from burned slopes into the stream in 2003, but because both 2002 and 2003 were dry years, the Forest Service's revised estimate was less than one ton per acre.

"We've seen a 25 percent increase in water flow into Lower Coal Creek since the Moose Fire," Sirucek said.

About 9 percent of the Lower Coal Creek drainage has been logged since 1954, the most recent being 512 acres in 2000. Historical logging activities account for about 34 tons of sediment deposited in Lower Coal Creek in 2003, but much more may have been deposited there in the past, the EPA report said.

"These historical harvest loads may be contributing to the high percentage of fine material in the stream substrate," the EPA report said.

Road density in Lower Coal Creek is below the recommended indicator, the EPA report said, but the Forest Service found 10 road sites that were actively contributing sediment to stream channels.

"It should be noted that road conditions have greatly improved in the Flathead National Forest over the past several years, and historical roads and historical road building activities may have contributed a much greater load of sediment to streams in the past," the EPA report said.

Lower Coal Creek is a "major depositional area," the EPA said, with significant amounts of large woody debris retaining pockets of sediment, as well as channelization, historical riparian clear-cuts and a lack of stream side management zone in various sections. An estimated 697 tons of sediment per year was attributed to identified bank erosion sites, but the EPA suspected the true amount would be higher.

Lee Downes, a year-round resident of Coal Creek, said he recalled a bulldozer channelizing the creek in the late 1960s. He also said he heard about a gold dredge working up Coal Creek in the 1880s.

Steg said an application for a "319" grant could provide about $100,000 for Coal Creek.

"First we need to find out what is causing the problem before we can know what fixes are possible," he said. "If a problem is thought to be caused by natural forces, it could be left to Mother Nature to fix."

Using a bulldozer to recreate the natural stream flow in Lower Coal Creek "is not likely to be economically feasible," Steg said. The creek is about 75 feet wide and two-to-three-feet deep during spring runoff.