Summary of Recommendations 



trout streams. 

 19. Conduct a two- to three-day sympo- 

 sium/workshop during spring 1992 at 

 the Flathead Lake Biological Station to 

 specifically address innovative means 

 of timber harvest, road building, and 

 other timber transport methods that may 

 be used in the Flathead Basin with the 

 goal of eliminating sediment delivery 

 to surface waters. The product of the 

 workshop should be testable hypothe- 

 ses that may be used in a series of 

 "Demonstration Projects" accompa- 

 nied by effective cooperative scientific 

 study and monitoring of sediment rout- 

 ing and delivery, and other key water 

 quality and fisheries parameters. For 

 example,ademonstration project might 

 be to quantitatively test the effective- 

 ness of specific BMPs, road paving, 

 cable logging, etc., by pre- and post- 

 activity monitoring of various water 

 quality and fisheries parameters in ad- 

 jacent surface waters. Such monitoring 

 would fall under the short-term moni- 

 toring effort described below. 



Monitoring and Additional 3Tt jd y Nffhs 

 OF Stream Water Quality and Fisheries 



In 1985 the Flathead Basin Commission 

 (FBC) adopted a water quality and fisheries 

 Monitoring Master Plan. The comments and 

 recommendations for monitoring or further 

 study are made within the context of that Ma^rer 

 Plan. 



We recommend that two types of water 

 quality and fisheries monitoring sites be estab- 

 lished — long-term sites and short-term sites. 

 These are summarized briefly here. 



Long-term monitoring should have the pur- 

 pose of establishing baseline conditions and 



evaluating long-term changes that may be 

 masked over short time periods by interannual 

 variation. These long-term monitoring stations 

 should be representative of the various domi- 

 nant physical/geological conditions of the land 

 and with various levels and types of manage- 

 ment activity. Long-term monitoring should be 

 conducted on a routine, non-intensive basis. 

 Monitoring parameters should consist of stream 

 discharge, routine nutrients, sediments, and other 

 basic water chemistry parameters, as well as 

 fisheries variables. Data from the long-term 

 monitoring stations could also be used for vali- 

 dation of various models used to assist land 

 managers in decision making. 



Short-term monitoring should have the pur- 

 pose of monitoring specific activities. Short- 

 term monitoring stations should change through 

 time with a comparatively short time frame of 

 commitment to any particular site. Short-term 

 monitoring sites should have a multi-year life- 

 time, beginning two years before the activity, 

 one year during the activity, and two years after 

 the activity. Data from short-term monitoring 

 stations may also be used for model validation, 

 BMP effectiveness monitoring. Demonstration 

 Project evaluation, or evaluation of other pro- 

 posed forest practice changes designed to re- 

 duce impacts on water quality. 



With the large amounts of money spent on 

 monitoring, a great opportunity exists to design 

 monitoring efforts so they can be used to test 

 research hypotheses as well as accomplish 

 monitoring goals. These efforts should be de- 

 veloped in concert with the following specific 

 monitoring and study recommendations which 

 were taken from the individual study modules. 

 They are not listed by order of preference or 

 priority. 



20. We recommend that lake basins sup- 

 porting future, long-term timber har- 

 vest and road building activities have a 



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Flathead Basin Cooperative Program Final Report 



