The Science of River Restoration
Open Rivers Fund follows a path carved, in large part, by the current scientific understanding of river health.
Thanks to decades of dam removal data, scientists and engineers can increasingly predict what will happen when a dam is removed. The hydraulics of dam removal are well understood.
The greater scientific challenge, at this point, is in better understanding how river biology changes when barriers, large and small, are removed from rivers and streams.
To this end, Open Rivers Fund supports projects and organizations conducting research on river conditions before and after removal. Longitudinal data is best for assessing change, but even a single baseline survey is a valuable starting point.
We respect and support the work of Native American Tribes in restoring rivers and watersheds. Traditional Ecological Knowledge practiced by Indigenous communities for millennia is an important strategy for restoring river life.
Citizen Science Benefits Rivers and Communities
Multiple Open Rivers Fund projects involve investments in citizen science efforts to monitor river conditions, boost community understanding of science, and build community support. Growth in this field is important – and remarkable.
Local organizations are successfully engaging volunteers of varying levels of scientific knowledge and experience: scientists with advanced degrees, high school students, seniors, and all kinds of people in between. At the outset of any citizen science project, volunteers are developing processes and protocols to ensure accurate data is collected and analyzed in formats sharable with regulators and the public. In many cases, data quality standards are ratcheting upward.
Monitoring river conditions can be expensive. Volunteer citizen scientists expand the capacity to collect valuable data and document change following dam removal. As importantly, this work can create a lifelong connection to the river and the life it supports. Citizen scientists on the river often become life-long advocates for river health.
Resources
Below are links to studies, reports, manuals, and other documents that advance the science of dam removal and river restoration.
Facilitating Tribal Co-Management of Federal Public Lands
This paper responds to calls from environmental advocacy organizations and Tribes to explore the obstacles of Tribal co-management on federal lands and propose solutions.
Get ResourceEnvironmental DNA is an effective tool to track recolonizing migratory fish following large-scale dam removal
This study uses environmental DNA (eDNA) to assess the effectiveness of dam removal to restore fish passage on the Elwha River in Washington State.
Get ResourceManual for community science and dam removal
Produced by the UC Davis Center for Community and Citizen Science, this manual is written specifically for citizen science efforts linked to dam removal and watershed restoration.
Get ResourceUSGS Dam Removal Portal
A tool to explore trends about dam removal science and query scientific studies that evaluate environmental response to dam removals.
Get ResourceEvery Tribe Has A Wound, Can Tribal Government-to-Government Consultation Help Mend It?
Thought-provoking reflections on the historical and legal underpinnings of government-to-government Tribal consultations and their importance in advancing the environmental conservation efforts of Tribes and healing from historical inequity.
Get ResourceIndigenous Systems of Management for Resilient Pacific Salmon Fisheries
Through generations of interdependence with salmon, Indigenous Peoples developed sophisticated systems of management. These systems and practices showcase pathways for sustained productivity and resilience in contemporary salmon fisheries.
Get ResourceDam Removal and River Restoration
This paper discusses dam removal by focusing on the importance of rivers as providers of vital ecosystem services like food, energy, and water. Dams are the most prevalent agents of change to the world’s rivers. The vast majority of the world’s estimated 16 million dams are relatively small, less than 10 meters in height.
Get ResourceElevating Freshwater Ecosystems in 30x30
The impairment of California’s freshwater ecosystems not only places native freshwater species at a higher risk of extinction compared to their terrestrial counterparts, it also threatens the valuable ecosystem services and cultural resources that freshwater ecosystems provide.
Get ResourceReconnecting the Elwha River: Spatial Patterns of Fish Response to Dam Removal
The removal of two large dams on the Elwha River was completed in 2014 with a goal of restoring anadromous salmonid populations. Using observations from ongoing field studies, this paper compiles a timeline of migratory fish passage upstream of each dam.
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