MARMOT CREEK BASIN: MANAGING FORESTS FOR WATER

CABIN AND TWIN CREEK EXPERIMENTS 1962-1987

Subbasin

MARMOT CREEK SUBBASINS

Drainage Area (ha) Treatment (completion date)

Cabin Creek Middle Creek 212 (50%)* 285 Twin Creek

*Percentage below tree line

264 (50%) Commercial cut (1974) None (control) Honeycomb cut (1979)

OBJECTIVE OF CABIN CREEK TREATMENT

To determine if the guidelines of the Alberta Forest Service for commercial cutting in spruce-fir forests were satisfactory for maintaining the volume of high quality water that these watersheds yield

(Swanson et al., 1986)

• • • • •

ALBERTA FOREST SERVICE GUIDELINES

No debris from road construction and maintenance, and logging shall be allowed to enter any water courses Roads shall be located and constructed so as to cause a minimum of soil erosion and sediment deposition in streams, and no road shall restrict the natural flow of streams Abandoned skid roads and trails shall have adequate drainage to prevent erosion No green timber shall be cut within 100 feet of the high water mark of any water course Logging methods (i.e. skidding) shall be confined to the use of horses, rubber tired skidders or crawler tractors

(Rothwell 1977)

THE COMMERCIAL CUTTING ON CABIN CREEK SUBBASIN

(Rothwell, 1977)

1 2 6 5 4 3

(Rothwell 1977)

OBSERVED AND PREDICTED SWE ON CABIN SUBBASIN BELOW TREELINE AT MAXIMUM SNOW PACK, 1975-1977 200 180 160 140 120 100 80 60 40 20 0 All cut blocks All adjacent areas

(After Golding and Swanson 1986)

Observed Predicted Cabin basin uncut Cabin basin below treeline

PREDICTED VS OBSERVED STREAMFLOWS FOR CABIN CREEK DURING THE POSTTREATMENT PERIOD 200 160 120 80 Predicted if left uncut Observed after logging 40 0 Jan Feb March April May June July Aug. Sept. Oct. Nov. Dec.

(After Swanson et al., 1986)

OBJECTIVE OF TWIN CREEK TREATMENT

To prolong recession flow from snowmelt and/or delay the time to peak runoff

(Research Coordinating Committee, Alberta Watershed Research Program, 1977)

HYDROGRAPHS ILLUSTRATING OBJECTIVE OF THE TWIN CREEK TREATMENT

40 Noname Creek (Control) 35 Fox Creek (60% logged) 30 25 20 15 10 5 0 05.май 15.май 25.май 04.июн 14.июн 24.июн 04.июл 14.июл 24.июл 03.авг

1974

(After Swanson and Hillman 1977)

Mean maximum snow accumulation, 1973-1976, in forest

openings at James River, near Caroline. (After Golding 1977) 7 6 9 8 13 12 11 10

0 1/4 1/2 3/4 1 2 3 4 5 6 Opening diameter (tree heights (H) )

Mean snow accumulation at last measurement of the season,

1973-1976, James River, near Caroline (After Golding , 1977)

4,5 4 3,5 3 2,5 2 1,5 1 0,5 0 0 1/4 1/2 3/4 1 2 3 4 5 Opening diameter (tree heights (H)) 6

DETAILS OF TWIN CREEK SUBBASIN TREATMENT

• • • • • •

Based on the James River results, treatment of Twin consisted of 2103 circular clearings of 15 m and 20 m diameter, or 3/4 to 1 1/2 times the height of the surrounding forest 40% (52.8 ha) of the forested area cleared Mechanical clearing over most of the subbasin Clearings centred on alternate intersections of a square grid 15 or 20 m apart Slash and non-merchantable trees were flattened Merchantable trees were removed in tree lengths with rubber-tired skidders. Horse logging was tried on a small portion of the subbasin

(Golding and Swanson, 1986)

HONEYCOMB TREATMENT APPLIED TO TWIN CREEK SUBBASIN

(Golding and Swanson, 1986)

SNOW ACCUMULATION ON TWIN SUBBASIN BELOW TREELINE AT MAXIMUM SNOWPACK, MARCH 1980-1982 (410 MEASUREMENT POINTS) 300 250 200 150 100 50 0 Subbasin Actual Subbasin predicted Clearings Intervening forest

(After Golding and Swanson 1986)

1980 1981 1982 All years

EFFECTS OF TWIN TREATMENT ON STREAMFLOW

Nakiska resort and ski runs were built between 1985 and 1987; some ski runs intruded on Twin Creek subbasin (also snow- making machines?) Streamflow was measured on Cabin, Middle and Twin Creeks up to the end of 1986 This suggests that there are five years of post-treatment streamflow data (1980 -1984) that can be used to evaluate the effects of the Twin treatment, or 4 years if we exclude the year following treatment I used all the data available for Middle Creek and Twin Creek to obtain some tentative results. I defined 1964 – 1977 as the pretreatment period and 1980 – 1986 as the posttreatment period

CALIBRATION FOR PREDICTING TWIN CREEK JUNE STREAMFLOW

1000 900 800 700 600 500 400 300 200 100 0 0 100 slope = 0.912

intercept = 97.836

200 300 400 500 600 700 800 Middle Creek - June streamflow (dam 3 ) 900 1000

Water Survey of Canada data

PREDICTED VS OBSERVED STREAMFLOWS FOR TWIN CREEK DURING THE POST- TREATMENT PERIOD 500,0 Predicted Observed 400,0 300,0 200,0 100,0 0,0 Jan Feb Mar

Water Survey of Canada data

Apr May June July Aug Sept Oct Nov Dec