Key Principles of Stream Habitat Management

These are key principles I developed for stream habitat management throughout the course of the semester.

They are separated into best practice principles and best available science principles.

 

1)        The strategy for rehabilitating a stream is dependant on primary goals of the project (i.e. fisheries, biodiversity, aesthetics). “Best Practices Principle”

2)         Goals for stream restoration should be realistic.  “Best Practices Principle”

3)                  Stream Habitat rehabilitation is expensive. So, managers should plan accordingly. “Best Practices Principle”

4)                  The natural system in question must be properly evaluated to determine an appropriate management system. This may require a standardized evaluation method. “Best Available Science Principle”

This principle seems to have been studied pretty extensively as there is much debate on evaluation methods.

            Roper, B.B., J.L. Kershner, E. Archer, R. Henderson, and N. Bouwes. 2002. An evaluation of physical stream habitat attributes used to monitor streams. Journal of the American water resources association 38: 1637-1646.

5)                  Management activities need to take into account stream changes on a spatial and temporal scale. “Best Available Science Principle”

This is somewhat common sense, due to the fact that many scientists study geomorphology independently of stream habitat management and have relayed information on it.

            Sear, D.A. 1994. River restoration and geomorphology. Aquatic conservation: marine and freshwater ecosystems 4: 169-177.

6)                  Effective management strategies will require cooperation between, and equal input from, scientists, funding agencies, property owners, and other stakeholders.  “Best Available Science Principle”

This principle has been studied extensively as many managers have had to find this out for themselves the hard way.  Conceptual frameworks and guides have been created to assist managers in approaching this most effectively.

            Rhoads, B.L., D. Wilson, M. Urban, and E.E. Herricks. 1999. Interaction between scientists and nonscientists in community-based watershed management: emergence of the concept of stream naturalization. Environmenal management 24: 297-308.

7)         Value systems within human populations have been the driver of most stream habitat problems. “Best Practices Principle” pretty much common sense…

8)         Two forces (stream protection and economic development and use) must be balanced by good managers of stream habitat. “Best Practices Principle”

9)         Managers should realize that a lag in the temporal scale makes it difficult to connect stream metrics to their effects on organisms. “Best Practices Principle”

10)              Active adaptive management, though costly and risky, is a necessary approach to rehabilitating streams due to the large time scales many stream functions work on. “Best Available Science Principle”

This principle has been studied a lot recently, due to the fact that scientists know it is necessary for success in large-scale, expensive operations.

            Prato, T. 2003. Adaptive management of large rivers with special reference to the Missouri river. Journal of the American water resources association 39: 935-946.

11)       Stream ecosystems develop in unpredictable fashion and have dynamic equilibrium. “Best Available Science Principle”

            This has been studied more recently to incorporate more ecosystem approaches to stream habitat management.

Minshall, G.W. 1988. Stream ecosystem theory: a global perspective. Journal of the North American Benthological society 7: 263-288.

12)       Streams require a mosaic of interdependent habitats, in order to provide different species and communities with habitats suitable to their survival and fitness. “Best Available Science Principle”

This principle has been important to researchers for decades as they have attempted to save many types of species in streams.

            Gorman, O.T. and J.R. Karr. 1978. Habitat structure and stream fish communities. Ecology 59: 507-515.

13)       Biological monitoring and biological endpoints provide the most integrative view of river condition, or river health. “Best Available Science Principle”

            This has been recently studied to convince other scientists, biological metrics are appropriate indicators in streams.

Norris, R.H. and M.C. Thoms. 1999. What is river health? Freshwater biology 41: 197-209.

14)       Monitoring, after rehabilitation efforts in streams, is essential in the final evaluation of success or failure. “Best Available Science Principle”

            This has been studied a lot due to the fact that lots of money goes into stream rehabilitation efforts. Bosses want to know if their money has been well spent.

House, R.A. and P.L. Boehne. 1985. Evaluation of instream enhancement structures for salmonid spawning and rearing in a coastal Oregon stream. North American journal of fisheries management 5: 283-295.

15)              Monitoring successes and failures need to be shared among agencies and researchers to aid others in nation-wide and world-wide stream rehabilitation efforts. “Best Available Science Principle”

This is a new principle as scientists begin to realize the lack of success and failure literature available across the United States with regards to stream restoration.

Bernhardt, E.S., M.A. Palmer, J.D. Allan, G. Alexander, K. Barnas, S. Brooks, J. Carr, S. Clayton, C. Dahm, J. Follstad-Shah, D. Galat, S. Gloss, P. Goodwin, D. Hart, B. Hassett, R. Jenkinson, S. Katz, G.M. Kondolf, P.S. Lake, R. Lave, J.L. Meyer, T.K. O’Donnell, L. Pagano, B. Powell, E. Sudduth. 2005. Synthesizing U.S. river restoration efforts. Science 308: 636-637.