GRESHAM, Oregon — Restoring fish habitat along a creek in east Multnomah County got some big-time air support on Monday.
A section of Beaver Creek runs adjacent to the Mt. Hood Community College campus on its way to flow into the Sandy River. The work Monday was all about airlifting big timbers into place, creating log jams along the creek.
The helicopter deployed to do the job was a powerful one, a dual-engine Boeing Vertol, which had no problem lifting 70-foot-long uprooted Douglas fir trees, root ball and all, and then setting them strategically along Beaver Creek.
“The helicopter picks up the log from one place, and the amazing pilot puts the log within a foot of where you want it — it's really incredible flying and incredible engineering work by our design team,” said Jonathan Soll, Metro’s science and stewardship division manager.
The work involves about a 1-mile stretch of Beaver Creek and 74 logs airlifted into place to create 23 log jams.
That will create a better habitat for salmon, steelhead and Pacific lamprey, species that need to move to or from the ocean during their life cycles. With the log structures in place, fish will have shade and protected hiding places in slow-moving water, critical for their survival.
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The method of placing the logs is very efficient and better for the surrounding environment, said Solls.
“We're using a large helicopter to place the logs so that we don't have to make a mess with building a road for heavy equipment to move around in the stream channel,” Solls explained.
And the sooner the work is complete, the better for creatures that have seen their habitats damaged over the decades. Experts say restoration projects like this help Pacific Northwest fish make a comeback.
“These are iconic animals that have been a part of our ecosystem since time immemorial; they're important to a huge majority of our community members, and if we're going to protect them and improve populations, we have to restore habitats,” said Solls.
Metro bought land to create the 63-acre South Beaver Creek Natural Area. That, and the restoration work on Beaver Creek and other creeks as well, is thanks to voter-approved parks and nature bond measures in 1995 and 2019.