Lower Skagit

Place

Places are locations in the landscape recognized by people

Regions

• Admiralty Inlet
• Comox Coast
• Discovery Islands
• East Sound
• Fraser Lowlands
• Gulf Islands
• Hood Canal
• Qualicum Coast
• San Juan Islands
• South Puget Sound
• South Vancouver Island
• Squamish
• Strait of Juan de Fuca
• Sunshine Coast
• West Sound
• Whidbey Basin

Salish Sea References

• Watershed Characterization Mapper
• The Encyclopedia of Puget Sound
• PRISM Project Search
• Washington Coastal Atlas
• WDFW's Salmonscape Map

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The Lower Skagit includes where the lower reaches of the Skagit River enters the lowland floodplain near the City of Sedro Wooley, past the cities of Burlington and Mt. Vernon and into the Skagit Delta. This includes the Nookachamps Watershed, as well as small streams flowing off Devil's Mountain, flowing into various ditches that feed into Fisher Slough. Together with the Samish River watershed and floodplain, this includes the most productive agricultural area in the Salish Sea. This landscape is identified as a level 10 Hydrologic Unit Code (HUC10) in the National Hydrologic Dataset.

Notes

• Should this definition of "place" include or exclude the Samish for the purpose of ecosystem work? The Samish has many distinctions: 1) an increased focus on shellfish, and 2) differences with the Samish Tribe. There are also similarities: 1) within the same WRIA and County and within a single agricultural community.

TMDL History

• Lower Skagit Tributaries violate temperature standards for water quality
• Meredith 2007 documents change in riparian vegetation https://apps.ecology.wa.gov/publications/SummaryPages/0703050.html
• Ecology 2008 is the publication of an improvement report for the temperature TMDL https://apps.ecology.wa.gov/publications/documents/0810020.pdf
• Hyatt 2021 describes riparian zone conditions in the lower skagit using LIDAR http://skagitcoop.org/wp-content/uploads/SkagitLidarRiparian_20210225.pdf
• Greenberg & Carson 2010 describes a County Assessment of riparian land use in the lower skagit https://www.skagitcounty.net/SalmonStrategy/Documents/White%20Paper%20v23%20booklet-style.pdf
• Starting in 2019 Ecology has supported a Skagit Tributaries Temperature Strategy effort https://www.ezview.wa.gov/site/alias__1962/37691/skagit_tributaries_temperature_strategy.aspx
• Ecology 2020 defines an implementation strategy for resolving the temperature TMDL.
• A survey of landowners has been completed and a report is forthcoming.