PNW 98 Session - Full Abstracts

Full Abstract

Klaus O. Richter
KATHERINE A. HOUCK

King County Department of Natural Resources, Seattlle, WA

King County wetland mitigation bank study: Methods, restoration, monitoring and first year results.

Wetland mitigation banking is a controversial practice that is designed to stem the loss of wetlands by insuring successful restoration and creation while simultaneously streamlining wetland mitigation policy established by government agencies. The absence of standardized scientific methods and techniques to plan and mitigate projects, a lack of consistent and efficient monitoring and an inadequate understanding of the habitat requirements of wetland plants and animals may explain some of the problems with wetland mitigation.

Our King County Wetland Mitigation Banking Pilot Project is an attempt to effectively address these concerns through targeted habitat creation and enhancement and monitoring. Although our overall goal is to create and restore wetland acreage and protective buffers, a specific goal is to increase habitat for wildlife. For amphibians this included providing additional spawning areas by enlarging and reconfiguring wetland morphometry and by creating several additional small ponds. Boulders were imported to the site to create basking and cover sites for reptiles and mammals. Shrubs and trees were planted within a Spiraea monoculture to improve bird habitat by creating additional vegetation structure.

This presentation briefly details these restoration activities, identifies the methods we use to establish success or failure, and describes additional monitoring to determine the underlying factors that account for observed results. Moreover we present preliminary results after our first year of monitoring.

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