ESP 169, Spring 2008: Watershed Adaptive Management Scoping Project

 

Overview

The goal of this project is to conduct a basic "Watershed Adaptive Management Scoping" as described in the recently completed California Watershed Assessment Manual.  Watershed adaptive management is a multi-step, iterative process consisting of watershed monitoring, assessment, planning, implementation, and evaluation. Inherent to the process is a period of learning based on changing conditions that leads to improved decision-making to correct problems.  Scoping is the first step in watershed management, and becomes the basis for data collection and writing of management plans.  Your team will develop a statement of purpose for managing environmental problems in the watershed, identify relevant ecological processes and endpoints, and assess existing policies.  Chapter 2 of the California Watershed Assessment Manual (link below) provides a more detailed guidance for this exercise. 

 

Information Sources for California Watersheds

California Watershed Assessment Manual, Full Version: http://cwam.ucdavis.edu,

CWAM Indicators Chapter:   http://www.cwam.ucdavis.edu/Volume_2/CWAM_II_1_Indicators.doc

California Watershed Portal:  http://cwp.resources.ca.gov/browser/index.epl

Information Center for the Environment Watershed Data: http://www.ice.ucdavis.edu/newcara/

CALWATER Watershed Map: http://cwp.resources.ca.gov/browser/index.epl

 

Critical Dates

  • Teams Assigned: April 3
  • Professional Training:  April 17

·         Watershed Choice: One paragraph description of watershed due Thursday, May 8. 

·         Final Watershed Scoping Due: 20 pages maximum, double spaced due Thursday, May 22.

·         Team Presentations:  15 minute Powerpoint presentations  Tuesday, June 3 and Thursday, June 5.

 

Watershed Scoping Elements

 

  1. Watershed Adaptive Management Statement of Purpose

 

1.       Text Box: Identify Purpose:  The overall purpose of watershed management programs is to understand natural and social processes, and take policy actions designed to limit harm and encourage restoration. The “adaptive” part of watershed management occurs when assessments of changing conditions and the responses of the watershed to management are used to make new decisions. Describe a specific environmental or social goal for your watershed management program.  For example, a statement of purpose for your watershed assessment might be "Determine sustainability of native fish populations in the stream".  Your group may also choose a social goal, such as educating the general public about water quality conditions.  The goal could be to improve a degraded watershed condition, or preserve a pristine condition.

 

2.       Describe Importance:  Explain why the watershed management purpose chosen is important and how the management process could be adaptive.  The statement of purpose will evolve over time as you learn more about your watershed, in particular the types of environmental problems that exist. 

 

3.       Interview Experts:  Each group must interview at least one expert familiar with your watershed. Look for people with expertise in the particular management goal described in your statement of purpose.  These experts can usually be found through the various Internet resources.

 

 

 

  1. Watershed Description

 

1.       Basic Facts:  What is the size of the watershed you are looking at? What are the important land-use characteristics of the watershed? What are some of the basic hydrological features (e.g., dams, river flows etc) of the watershed?

 

2.       History of Human Activities: What is the history of human development of water resources within the watershed?  What are some of the major water conflicts that have occurred in the watershed? How are human activities connected to environmental conditions in the watershed?  All of these activities should be considered in light of the main goal of the watershed management exercise. 

 

  1. Watershed Management Conceptual Model and Indicators

 

1.       Ecological or Social Endpoints

Identify the ecological or social endpoints that should be targeted in order to achieve your goals.  For example, an ecological indicator for native fish species might be the population of reproducing Steelhead trout in a stream.  You should include discussion of current status of endpoints, information basis for assessing that status, and future information needs.  Also describe the ecological, environmental, and social consequences of declines in these endpoints.

 

2.       Watershed Processes Influencing Endpoints

Identify at a general level the types of ecological or social processes that influence the ecological endpoint of concern. Examples include water flow regimes, habitat availability, sediment loads, etc.  You do not have to discuss these processes in excruciating ecological detail; just do enough research to understand them at a general level.  

 

3.       Human Activities Influencing Watershed Processes

Identify the human activities that influence the watershed processes and endpoints.  These can include land-use activities, water diversions, pollution, resource extraction, etc.

 

 

 

4.       Draw a Conceptual Model

A conceptual model is a graphical representation of the relationship between human activities, watershed processes, potential impacts or sources of stress and the effects on ecological function/endpoints.  The conceptual model makes explicit statements about hypothesized functional relationships underlying management decisions regarding environmental resources. An example of a simple conceptual model is presented here. Your team should produce a conceptual model for the watershed you have chosen with at least this level of detail.   

 

5.       Select Watershed Indicators

Indicators are attributes of a system that tell you something about how well the system is doing and what influences the system. When you measure these things, you can potentially make statements about how “healthy” the system is, how effective management actions are in protecting system health, and how things are changing over time. The indicators can be things like fish populations, rates of water withdrawals, % impervious surface (urban areas), and extent of water quality violations. Based on your conceptual model above, select at least one indicator of the ecological, social, or economic conditions of the watershed.  The indicators should reflect the watershed management goals expressed in your statement of purpose (Section A1).  You must gather actual data on this indicator for you watershed, and have at least 5 years of data (it could be one observation per year, or daily data).  The data should be graphed (using Excel or another graphics program) in a way that allows interpretation of watershed conditions by a layperson.  You can find a lot of the data on the Internet, or you can ask experts from your particular watershed to point out some data sources.

 

  1. Public Policy Analysis

 

    1. Identify Relevant Policies

Each of the human activities identified in your conceptual model are subject to a variety of public policy rules.  We will discuss many of these policies in the class, but there are always more specific ones at the watershed level. Try to identify and describe the most relevant local, state, and federal laws/policies/programs influencing human activities.

 

    1. Identify Relevant Actors

Public policies are implemented by specific agencies, officials, and interest groups.  Identify the key actors involved with the policies.

 

    1. Policy Recommendations

Given the current status of the ecological endpoints, watershed processes, human activities, and public policies, what recommendations would you make for policy changes? How could these policies be responsive to changing watershed conditions? In theory, if there is a threat to a watershed, there should be something "wrong" about the policies that need changing.  Identify those policy needs. 

 

  1. References

1.       In-Paper References:  All quotes and paraphrases in the document should have parenthetical references.  For example: 

 

According to Clarke and McCool (1996), the Forest Service is one of the most powerful public land agencies. 

(or)

The forest service is one of the most powerful public lands agencies (Clarke and McCool 1996)

2.       Bibliography:  All references should be documented.  Include books, articles, personal interviews (name, date), Internet sources (include http//: address), and class lecture materials.  Make sure you include author, title, publication date, and any relevant issue numbers.  Bibliography should adhere as closely as possible to conventions of Chicago Manual of Style (although we will not grade down if all the information is there).

 

  1. Group and Individual Grading

 

The watershed exercise is worth 40% of your grade, or 80/200 points.  I will assign 60 of those points on the basis of the final watershed management exercise.  The other 20 points will be based on your own self-grading of the other students in your group.  So, in addition to the watershed management exercise, each individual in the group will hand in a separate one-page document that describes the tasks completed by each member of the group.  That document will also give a score out of 20 points to each other member of the group.  I will then average that score and assign it to the other group members.  For example, if you receive an average score of 15 points from your other group members, and the group as a whole receives 55 points for the project, your final paper grade will be 70/80.