Conn Creek Land Lab Pilot Project (Request No. 1652-2026-093-001-R3)

The Project will implement biotechnical and rock bank stabilization measures using a combination of native rock, woody debris, brush, and strategic vegetation placement in designs that include brush and gully packing, backfilled one log and rock dams, live plantings, and woody wattle measures at each action area to reduce bank erosion, sedimentation, and destabilization, and to increase native vegetation communities with functions and services greater than existing conditions. Measures will be installed primarily by hand, with mini excavators, tracked utility vehicles, and water trucks. Most materials will be sourced from uplands on-site or nearby properties (e.g. vine wood, oak and conifer limbs and brush, willow cuttings, rock, acorns, etc.). No excavators or tracked vehicles will be used in the creek beds. Revegetation efforts will consist of native species seeding, container planting, and selective competing species placement and invasive removal actions to encourage native species recruitment at the tops of banks and into the riparian transition zone between waters and the riparian corridor to increase the area's mix of herbaceous ground cover, understory shrubs, and trees native to the region and adapted to the area. The Project will also implement a grazing and exclusion plan to protect the riparian understory and new vegetation.