The Oregon Department of Fish and Wildlife is looking to acquire two parcels of land in the Willamette Valley. The plan for both properties is to restore them to their natural habitat and make them available for public use.
The properties include Hayden Island west of Salem on the Willamette River and North East Coyote Creek which is adjacent to Fern Ridge Wildlife Area. Currently the 270-acre Hayden Island parcel is owned by a private company. Laura Tesler is the Wildlife Mitigation Coordinator for the ODFW. She says the property is special because it contains one of the last remnants of floodplain forest on the Willamette River.
Tesler: "It has fully mature cottonwoods and a good established undergrowth on the property. And because of that, ODFW believes that this would be a very good property to acquire."
The Hayden Island acquisition would cost about 3 million dollars. The Northeast Coyote Creek plot is 225 acres and currently being used for agriculture. Tesler says the habitat used to be wet and upland prairie habitat that housed the western meadowlark and the streaked horned lark.
Tesler: "It's our hope that we can bring this habitat up the condition where they would begin to colonize it and us it more extensively."
Tesler says restoration of Northeast Coyote Creek would also include reintroduction of endangered native plant species such as Bradshaw's lomatium and the Willamette Daisy. Funding for both pieces of land is being provided by the Willamette Wildlife Mitigation Program and other state agencies.
Email Laura Tesler at laura.tesler@state.or.us
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