Farmland flooded for salmon nursery

Two excavator bulldozers loomed over a slowly widening hole in the dike, as water rushed through for the first time in a century on Monday.

Their powerful scoops scraped up piles of rock and dirt, clearing a new path for young salmon to enter and grow in an estuary habitat. Organizers at the Fir Island Farms Estuary on Monday celebrated the first results of the 7-year-long project to help restore the dwindling Chinook salmon population.

Removing part of the 3,110-foot dike allows the juvenile fish to swim into about 130 acres of new tidal marsh prior to traveling to the ocean.

The young fish will acclimate themselves in the mix of freshwater and saltwater in this estuary, said Richard Brocksmith, executive director of the Skagit Watershed Council. He was one of the many project partners who showed up to see the farmland be flooded, which was less of a dramatic tsunami than a slow tidal advance.

The project was led by the Washington Department of Fish and Wildlife and will result in a 200-foot hole in the dike by the time it’s finished.

“A lot of effort was put in to do no harm and make it better,” Brocksmith said, noting that the public still has access to the site, the snow goose reserve remains intact, drainage and weather concerns have been addressed and surrounding farmland won’t be affected.

It’s estimated that 65,000 to 320,600 new Chinook smolts will be added annually — the Chinook is a federally-listed threatened species. Part of the project includes closely monitoring the salmon population and effectiveness of the estuary expansion.

“It’s a win-win for everyone,” said Wendy Cole from the Washington Department of Fish and Wildlife office in La Conner. Bob Warinner, also from the La Conner department, said it’s been a long time coming.

An earlier phase of the project included building a new dike that begins near the Fir Island reserve parking lot. The $16.4 million project was roughly 15 percent federally funded, according to a press release.

The remaining amount came from grants and partners including The Nature Conservancy, Puget Sound Partnership, the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration and the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service. Other partners contributed their expertise.

Project manager Jenna Friebel said the estuary restoration is a step toward salmon recovery and is part of a continuing, larger effort to increase salmon populations.