Climate change, Big Horn Lake fisheries, recreation resources and technical reports dominated the fifth meeting of the Big Horn River System Long-term Issue Group, which met most of the day Thursday, Oct. 18, at the Bighorn Canyon National Recreation Area Cal S. Taggart Visitor Center east of Lovell.


Officials from a number of different federal and state agencies, from both Montana and Wyoming, gathered for the meeting, as well as interested members of the Friends of Bighorn Lake, which also provided lunch for the meeting.


The long-term issues group was formed in March as a coordinated effort to identify, explore and recommend alternative courses of action to local, tribal, state and federal entities responsible for managing the Big Horn River system resources for their consideration as part of a long-term management strategy, according to the group’s organizing statement.


A variety of groups and agencies have been involved including the Bureau of Reclamation, National Park Service, Crow Tribe, Friends of Bighorn Lake, Wyoming Game and Fish Dept., Montana Dept. of Fish, Wildlife and Parks, Big Horn County Commissioners, the office of Wyoming Gov.


Dave Freudenthal, the offices of Montana and Wyoming congressional representatives, the Wyoming State Engineer’s Office, the Bighorn River Alliance and others.
Moderated by Barb Beck of Beck Consulting, Thursday’s meeting began with an overview of previous meetings, which have rotated between Wyoming and Montana. She noted that the focus of the group is starting to shift from information gathering and reports to work being done by various technical teams.


Lenny Duberstein of the BOR’s Montana Area Office presented a Power Point program that reviewed the origins of the group, where things stand currently and where the group is headed in the future, noting that the group has been working on perceptions and defining problems, then moving on to analysis and alternatives. He said possible outcomes of the group’s efforts include improved operations and flexibility, improved runoff forecasting, better sediment management, improved recreation, better river habitat, improved economic opportunities and more.


Duberstein noted that it is important to document the efforts of the group and create a group memory of the work so that a working document can eventually be developed that will lead to decisions by an appropriate agency. Some issues will take a long time to work, he said.


Gary Hammond of Montana Fish, Wildlife and Parks said the large group meetings lead to political posturing and positioning and said small working groups might be more effective for short-term decisions. He said he would love to sit down with Wyoming people in regard to the fishery, for instance, and Bob Croft of the Friends of Bighorn Lake agreed that would be a good idea.


Mark Fowden of the Wyoming Game and Fish said the large group format is similar to a marathon, but meeting every six weeks is more like a sprint. He suggested that the smaller technical groups could meet more often and the large group less often.


That led to a discussion about process, and Big Horn County Commissioner Keith Grant asked if the end result of the group’s efforts would be a resource management plan. He said the long-term issues group could meet for months or even years and yet the same process would have to be followed again for an RMP.


“Why not start the resource management plan now?” Grant asked. “Yellowtail doesn’t have one now.”


Duberstein said the matter is complicated in that different agencies have different planning processes, but Mary Flanderka of the Wyoming Governor’s Planning Office said the planning processes are basically the same and that the National Environmental Policy Act does allow for joint agency work to reduce redundancy.


The issue is authority and “who does what,” Duberstein said, noting that developing a general management plan such as the National Park Service uses is a very involved process that could take 10 years. Bighorn Canyon NRA Supt. Darrell Cook said the issue is complicated by the involvement of different agencies at the local, state, federal and tribal levels in two states.


“As a manager with the Park Service it’s confusing to me how you can get all of these people to agree on an overall planning process that covers the whole thing,” Cook said. “And who takes the lead? Is the Park Service the lead agency? That doesn’t ensure that the Montana or Wyoming Game and Fish will go along with it.”


Duberstein said he hopes the end result will be a NEPA document that is manageable. Grant said he would like to see a management document that will last a long time but said he hopes something will be developed while he’s still around (in office).


Climate change
The mid-morning was occupied by a report from Wyoming State Climatologist Stephen Gray, who presented information on the dire nature of the drought in Wyoming.
Gray urged the group to consider climate change in any planning efforts, noting that drought is a part of life in the west whether it is manmade or natural. He also said the world climate is changing rapidly.


“The evidence that the climate is changing at an unprecedented rate is incontrovertible and overwhelming,” Gray said, leading to higher temperatures, melting glaciers and sea ice, higher sea levels, shifting ecological zones and thawing permafrost.


The problem with “worst case scenarios” presented in the media and in documentaries, however, is that it leads to the belief in the west that global climate change is fantastic or outlandish and is “happening to somebody else.” Far from being remote, he said, climate change will have a direct impact on the western U.S. and water resources.


Wyoming is the fifth driest state in the United States with an average of 16.84 inches of precipitation per year, Gray said. Only Nevada at 10.68 inches, Arizona at 13.13 inches, Utah at 13.9 inches and New Mexico at 14.9 inches of precipitation are drier.


Most of Wyoming is “very dry,” he said, with 71 percent of the state receiving less than 16 inches of precipitation annually. Most of the surface water supply in the west comes from one source, he said: mountain snow, which is being affected by climate change.


There is no consensus among seven different scientific models in regard to future precipitation, but there is more agreement, he said, among long-term climate models that the average annual temperature will rise from 3 to 7 degrees “within our lifetime” (around 2050), which will have “major consequences” for Wyoming’s water resources even if annual precipitation remains the same.


The problem, Gray said, is that the spring “melt-out” is coming four to eight weeks earlier than in the past, which decreases late-season runoff and increases evaporation.


Much of the high country precipitation during the spring comes in the form of snow that falls at just below freezing, so with an increase in average temperature of only a few degrees, that snow will turn to rain.


Rain runs off the mountains much more quickly, rather than soaking in, he said, and rain is not as good as snow for recharging groundwater stores. As an end result, late-season drought could be intensified and there could be significant consequences for western ecosystems, leading to drying forests, insect outbreaks and wildfires.


Even if humans are not causing climate change, drought is bound to happen no matter what, Gray said. An analysis of tree rings since the year 1260 shows that drought is “business as usual in this part of the world,” he said, with many droughts occurring over the centuries.
“Earth’s climate is changing and will continue to change,” Gray said. “Natural systems in the western U.S. are highly vulnerable to climate change, and under even the most conservative scenarios, climate change will have major impacts on water resources in the western U.S.”


Thus, Gray said, it is important for managers to plan how their policies will “make us more or less vulnerable to all kinds of climate change” and ask “how will changing land use, increased population, land disturbance, exotic species and climate interact to impact natural systems?”


“How can we integrate knowledge of long-term variability and change into all aspects of natural resource management?” Gray asked.


Sen. Ray Peterson asked if increasing water storage capacity would help level out the effects of drought, noting that storage may be the only option that will guarantee a consistent water flow to populated areas.


Gray replied that it is hard to deny that changes in infrastructure will be part of the solution in the future, but he also said there are a lot of inefficiencies in water storage systems and improved conservation of water is very important. Better monitoring methods are also important, he said.


“There are many factors that will be part of any viable response for the future,” he said.


Big Horn Lake fishery
The morning session concluded with a report on the Big Horn Lake fishery by biologist Mark Smith of the Wyoming Game and Fish Dept. Smith presented a detailed report on reservoir fishery management, species of fish in the lake and the Big Horn River of Wyoming and efforts to stock fish over the years.


Smith presented a history of the fishery management over time and said that in the most recent period, 1996-2007, the Game and Fish has managed Big Horn Lake for native game fish, forage fish and walleye. He said there has been no stocking at the reservoir since 2000.


Recent low water conditions have favored native river fish that were present prior to the formation of the reservoir such as sauger, channel catfish and ling, and he said forage fish such as emerald shiners are also an important component of the equation, especially with a growing population of small mouth bass in the lake.


Angler catches have been dominated by channel catfish, and good walleye catches in 1999 and 2000 were followed by dismal years due to the drought. Smith said there was a spike in native game fish catches in 2007 due to the higher water.


The biologist said higher lake levels are needed to improve the lake fishery in Wyoming. At an elevation of 3620 or below, there is really no reservoir fishery in Wyoming. At 3630 there is good angler access to flat water, but the water is turbid. At 3640 there is even better access for anglers and better water clarity for species that prefer deep, clear, cooler water.


The best-case scenario, Smith said, would be for the lake to rarely fall below 3630 and never below 3620. The lake should reach 3630 by May 1 and 3640 by mid-summer, with a drawdown to 3635 by Sept. 1.


Following a lunch break, John Keck of the National Park Service gave a presentation concerning recent trends in visitation and efforts to improve facilities in the national recreation area.


Keck said visitation at Bighorn Canyon NRA peaked around 1990 and there has been a downturn since then, but he also noted that visitation has also fallen at other western national parks and recreation areas in recent years.


He noted the recent improvements to recreation facilities including the Kane and south causeway boat ramps, as well as future planned projects such as improvements to the Horseshoe Bend campground and upgrades to the Taggart Visitor Center.


Technical reports
The rest of the afternoon was spent on reports from technical teams. Reports included:


• River channel degradation – Jeanne Godaire of the BOR’s Denver office reported on a proposed study of side channels in the Big Horn River north of Yellowtail Dam. The study would cost some $300,000 and would take three years.


• Recreation planning – Cook said Bighorn Canyon NRA is working on a recreation facilities plan and that Keck will be holding a series of meetings in the area in November to see what kind of facilities people are interested in at Big Horn Lake. The ideas will be prioritized and will serve as a basis for funding requests.


• Sedimentation – Stephanie Hellekson of the BOR Montana Area Office reported that the Bureau recently “kicked off” a sedimentation management study, working with the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers to look at how sediment is deposited under different operating scenarios.


• Flood pool modification – Gordon Aycock of the BOR Regional Office said the Bureau is working on a proposal to re-allocate flood control space in the reservoir, working with the Corps of Engineers. The idea is to assess the feasibility of raising the joint use pool by five feet to 3645, which would allow for more water storage and also allow for additional power generation.


Aycock also reported on how changes at other area reservoirs in the Big Horn River Basin have affected Big Horn Lake.


The next meeting of the long-term issues group has been scheduled for Thursday, Jan. 10, in Montana.