Watershed thinking

by:  Guillermo R. Giannico

What do you think of when you see a river?  Most people just see it as flowing water.  Do you ever think about the land it drains?   ( water flow )

Wherever you are on land, you find yourself within a watershed;  and no matter how far you are from the nearest river, water flowing both above and below ground connects you and your activities with the rest of the watershed.

The close links and interactions between rivers and the land they drain require that we look at them not just in terms of their water volume and flow and their channel characteristics but as components of larger systems called watersheds. A watershed is the area of land that is drained by creeks, streams and even a river to a common destination such as a lake, a larger river system, a bay or an ocean. The watershed captures precipitation, filters and stores water, and controls its release over time. Conceptually, a watershed can be considered a multi-layered universe, where large scale components (such as land topography or water flow regime) interact to control medium scale elements (such as the characteristics of stream channels or of adjacent forests), which in combination affect smaller spatial scale components (such as fish habitat or floodplain top-soil composition). Because of this connectivity among watershed components, isolated water management plans, soil conservation strategies, wildlife habitat protection initiatives or fish habitat enhancement projects are not effective and/or sustainable over time.

Historically, the management of different natural resources (i.e., watershed components) evolved as the responsibility of separate government agencies. These agencies not only have operated independently from each other, but also have tended to look at their "target" resource(s) in isolation from other resources and detached from the ecosystems they are part of.  As resource appropriation activities increased in intensity and scale this approach has been recognized as inefficient and unsustainable. Examples of this can easily be found in forestry, fisheries, mining, agriculture, tourism and water management. Therefore, the development of a watershed (or ecosystem) perspective applied to planning and management is fundamental to ensure that the benefits of environmentally viable economic activities and of local scale enhancement initiatives (which, for example, may help keep up or increase fish numbers, timber yield, water abundance and quality, etc.) are maintained in the long run. Our development plans and management strategies have to reflect the fact that the abundance and distribution of one particular resource, water for example, influences the abundance and distribution of other resources (such as forests, fish, game or fertile topsoil); in turn, these other resources interact with each other in so many direct and indirect ways that their independent management is clearly not viable. That is why integrated management plans, from a watershed perspective, are the best approach to sustainable management of natural resources.

In Langley, a unique exercise towards integrated management of natural resources from a watershed perspective began in 1993 with the formation of the Salmon River Watershed Management Partnership (SRWMP). The Salmon River Watershed, one of the most productive coho salmon systems in the Lower Fraser Valley, is home to approximately 14,000 people and has very important agricultural resources. Considering the rapid growth the lower mainland has undergone during the last 10 years, and with growth projections as high as fourfold for the next 20 years, there is great concern that the health of this watershed and its normal functioning (which provides many of us with drinking water, fertile agricultural land, salmon and trout, recreational opportunities and first class rural/residential real estate) will be adversely affected. The goal of managing the resources of the Salmon River Watershed in a sustainable manner represents a balancing act between social, environmental and economic considerations.

The SRWMP is a concerted effort by a variety of government agencies, non-government organizations, watershed residents and post-secondary educational institutions to change our traditional sectarian approach to resource management and to overcome the problem of fragmented jurisdictions among different levels of government and different agencies. The list of members of the SRWMP includes the Township of Langley; the Ministry of Environment, Lands and Parks (MELP); the Ministry of Agriculture and Food (MAF); Fisheries and Oceans Canada (DFO); Environment Canada; the Fraser Basin Council; the Salmon River Enhancement Society (SRES); Fort Langley Farmers Association; Langley Environmental Partners Society (LEPS); the Institute for Resources and Environment of the University of British Columbia (IRE-UBC); and several watershed residents.

A draft management plan for the Salmon River has been put together by the SRWMP with public input received via different consultation processes started in 1994. A second round of public consultations will begin this fall with an open house during which the latest version of the management plan will be presented. Feedback from local residents and community organizations will be asked for during the open house and subsequent public meetings.

If you want more information about the SRWMP or the Salmon River Management Plan you can contact Andrew Appleton: [email protected]