A River Reborn -- Tracking the Lower Owens River Revival
The revival of the 62-mile Lower Owens River is the largest river restoration project in the history of the American west. It's been a long time coming for residents of the Eastern Sierra. Ninety-five years ago the river vanished from the Owens Valley and was diverted to the Los Angeles Aqueduct, supplying water to the city of Los Angeles. But in December 2006 -- under court order -- snowmelt from the Sierra was redirected into the Lower Owens, breathing life back into the river. Now its waters support schools of brown trout, western king birds perched on tule reeds and majestic great blue herons.
If the restoration project is to maintain that goal, much will depend on the Los Angeles Department of Water and Power (LADWP) seeing eye-to-eye with Inyo County and environmentalists on the use of the river. The Sierra Club's successful lawsuit against the LADWP took 24 years to attain a verdict, eventually leading to a judicial order that launched the 77,657-acre project as mediation for environmental damage from the LADWP illegally pumping groundwater from a second aqueduct located in the Owens Valley south of Olancha, diverting more water to Los Angeles.
Drought, which could thwart the project and divert the flow of 55,000 cubic feet of Sierra snowmelt a year, is also an issue.
River ecologist Mark Hill says it could be 15 to 20 years before the river is fully restored. However, if the early returns are any indication, then the Lower Owens is on a steady track to recovery. During that time span, Hill, who works with Ecosystem Sciences Foundation in Idaho, will gauge the river's vitality, including its 3,500 acres of wetlands, increased flows, its water quality and its ever-increasing inhabitants.
Hill has worked on a number of river restoration projects around the globe including the Nile, Mekong and Ganges, and in North America along the Columbia, Snake, Rogue, Yuba and American rivers. But the Lower Owens will be the first river Hill has started from the ground up.
As Hill, his son Zach -- a keen paddler and an environmental planner for the Lower Owens -- and I ease down a five-mile section of the Lower Owens, we come across many new, robust willow trees hugging the edge of the runnel, the beginnings of that much-needed riparian canopy.
For decades, dried-up sage, tumbleweeds and cow manure choked the dusty, parched river bottom. Now with the Lower Owens being flooded each spring and transporting cottonwood and willow seeds, Hill and other ecologists will keep an eye out for a shady canopy of trees hovering above the mild current of a new river.
The replenished river is already attracting wildlife. Bobcats, minks, coyotes and ospreys have been sighted, herds of elk are in the vicinity, a great horned owl gazes back from its cottonwood perch and tree frogs hug the thick stocks of tule reeds. Over 400 bird species have been documented in the Owens Valley, and the rejuvenated Lower Owens will become a major stopover for a bevy of migrating bird species. A pair of Owens Valley suckers -- native fish -- swim beneath our kayaks. Of all the species of wildlife, Hill says the fish have recovered the fastest.
There's been no remodeling of channels or building up river banks lined with rocks and logs using heavy equipment. Instead, implementing river flows at the right time while removing cattle grazing and other land management actions have been the keys to success.
CHUCK GRAHAM is an environmental writer and outdoor photographer living in California.