DESCHUTES RIVER
MITIGATION & ENHANCEMENT

In the spring of 1989, the Oregon Department of Fish and Wildlife, in cooperation with the Deschutes River Mitigation and Enhancement Committee and the Central Oregon Irrigation District, began an improvement project upstream from the COID Siphon Power Plant. The purpose of the project was to restore much needed habitat for rainbow and brown trout. Ninety trees were used to build structures for fish. Trout use these structures for rearing, feeding, and hiding from predators. Several hundred boulders were rearranged to break velocity, hold spawning gravel, and provide holding areas for fish. Numerous pools were excavated for trout in otherwise shallow areas. Two hundred cubic yards of spawning gravel were placed in the project area. This gravel is also important as a substrate to produce aquatic insects on which trout feed.

The project will also improve habitat for aquatic wildlife such 
as otter, mink, beaver, and waterfowl. Additional fish will be produced for anglers, as well as fish-eating wildlife. These habitat improvements were designed to "naturalize" over time. As the structures and gravel naturalize, new improvements may be 
added in the future to compliment existing ones. 

This project provides a demonstration and evaluation site for fish habitat improvement techniques that will be used in other reaches 
of the Deschutes River in the future.

GAUGING STATIONS

In 1999 COID embarked on a project in conjunction with the Bureau of Reclamation to begin tracking water loss in its system. As agricultural, municipal, and environmental interests make more demands on the water supply, it becomes increasingly important for the district to carefully monitor the distribution of the available resource.

This was accomplished by placing gauging stations at strategic locations throughout the district, and continuously monitoring the canal system. Using radio telemetry, each station is equipped to transmit canal data to a central computer located in our office, where it is analyzed and archived. Factors such as turbidity, water temperature, air temperature, and water elevation (which indicates the amount of water at a given point in the system) can be tracked. In addition, alarms were added to alert COID personnel of abrupt changes in the level of canals or other problems at the stations.