Water, Water Everywhere
Clear, cold waters emerge from the Mission Mountains and the Swan Range and flow through the 410,000-acre Swan River watershed joining the Flathead River and eventually reaching the Pacific Ocean by way of the Columbia River. The Swan Valley holds more surface water than any other Montana watershed; 16 percent of the land is wet. Water collects in hundreds of pot holes, ponds, lakes, marshes and wetlands, and a 1,300-mile network of streams transports water throughout the valley. These wet areas and streamsides provide significant high quality habitat for native fish and wildlife and clean water for humans.
The Swan River and several of its tributaries provide significant habitat for bull trout, a federally-listed threatened species. Nearly half of the bull trout spawning redds on the Flathead National Forest are found in the clear, cold streams of the Swan Lake watershed.
Water Quality Celebration
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Maintaining Water Quality
The Swan Lake watershed faces two key water quality problems: sediment contributed from past activities that degraded water quality and conversion of timberlands to residential use. Development of roads and home sites have created water quality problems in the Swan Valley.
Technical Advisory Group
The Montana Department of Environmental Quality (DEQ) in 2004 completed a water quality study for the Swan Lake watershed. DEQ then published the "Water Quality Plan and TMDLs for the Swan Lake Watershed" available at www.deq.state.mt.us. With a grant from DEQ, Swan Ecosystem Center formed the Technical Advisory Group (TAG), made up of representatives of the agencies and organizations involved with protecting water quality in the watershed. The TAG meets periodically at Swan Ecosystem Center to prioritize and plan annual monitoring and restoration in the watershed based on DEQ's recommendations.
Monitoring and Restoration
 Swan Lake:
Water quality in Swan Lake is generally excellent, however dissolved oxygen levels in two deep basins reach unexpected low levels in the fall of each year. Low dissolved oxygen levels are of concern due to potential harm to aquatic life and as an indication of possible basin-wide increases in pollutants reaching the lake. SEC is conducting annual monitoring of Swan Lake to track trends in oxygen levels and track progress in water quality restoration in the basin.
Swan River and Tributaries:
- Temperature gauges installed each summer at key locations on the Swan River and its tributaries to establish baseline conditions and track changes over time.
- Aerial photos taken of the Swan River in 2005 that will be compared with photos taken periodically in the future to track channel movement within the river flood plains.
- Stream cross-sections established in 2005 that will be re-measured periodically to evaluate changes in channel geometry over time.
Road Restoration:
A key element of the restoration plan is to reduce sediment delivery to streams from roads. Land managers are working to achieve this goal. The TAG partners in 2006 reduced sediment delivery to streams from the Cold and Jim Lakes roads by approximately 33 tons. Approximately 25 drainage dips and two cross-drains that course water away from the creek were installed.
Additional road repair in the Cold, Elk and Glacier Creek basins to reduce sediment runoff was completed in August 2008. Work was begun in fall 2008 to reduce sedimentation from the Herrick Run Road. Plans are underway to reduce run-off in 2010-11 from the Beaver Creek Road.
Project Status Report
The water quality Project Status Report is a compilation of monitoring and restoration activities occurring in the Swan Lake watershed on lands managed by the Forest Service, Montana DNRC and Plum Creek Timber. The report has recently been completed and will help the TAG prioritize and plan projects to protect water quality in the watershed.
Water Quality Project Status Report - December 2008
Aquatic Habitat Monitoring in the Swan Valley
Download the Aquatic Habitat Monitoring in the Swan Valley 2009 Status Report prepared by Beth Gardner, Fisheries Biologist, Flathead National Forest.
(PDF format, 1.87 MBs)
How you can help protect water quality:
- Maintain and restore native vegetation.
- Maintain native vegetation on stream banks.
- Leave wetlands intact. Resist modifying wetlands to make ponds or meadows.
- Create native riparian buffers between streambanks and lawns or other landscaping.
- Build homes and structures on high ground far from lakeshores and streams and above the 100-year flood plain.
- Give streams room to move laterally within their banks. Avoid obstructing a stream's natural path.
- Fence stock away from waterways.
- Keep fertilizers, herbicides and pollutants away from streams and wetlands.
- Install septic systems outside riparian areas and the flood plain.
- When boating, reduce shoreline erosion to lakes by observing the 200-foot-from-shore No Wake rules.
Learning by Observing; Monitoring by Students
Salmon Prairie School and Swan Valley Elementary School students are monitoring water quality on Glacier Creek and entering the data on the Montana Watercourse Web site.
In 2006 students helped the U.S. Forest Service with a restoration project on the shore of Holland Lake. They also helped reconnect wetlands that had been severed by a road in the Beaver Creek area.
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