On January 28th, 2020, Sandy River Watershed Council staff member Melissa lead a tour of the Mt. Hood Community College campus for six students of the MHCC WR 122:05 English class and their instructor. During this tour students engaged in discussion and inquiry about the Salmon Safe projects and why these projects are happening on their college campus. The following blog post is the students response to what they learned that day.
The Sandy River Watershed Council seeks a creative Community Engagement Specialist. This person will inspire community members towards basin-wide stewardship in the Sandy River and its tributaries. The Community Engagement Specialist develops and implements communications strategies via digital and in-person engagement.
It’s a battle of natives and invaders. No, I’m not talking about American politics. You’ve probably read enough on that in today’s newspaper. This is a fight for stream habitat between non-native fishes and native salmon species in the upper Beaver Creek watershed. It’s a fight that humans unfortunately created out of self preservation, out of naivety, and without consideration for the consequences of these actions on our salmon’s survival.
A lot of amazing wildlife calls Beaver Creek home. Some of these animals are expected to live in or near this urban and agricultural creek, like crayfish, great blue herons, treefrogs, and beavers. Others have surprised some of us a bit over the years by living so close to a city, like salmon, eagles, otters, and mountain lions. One rare animal amazed us when we discovered that it was living here right alongside us: the Oregon slender salamander.
Yes, poop. That’s what I said. Turds, droppings, feces, or the “dookie”, by another name. I’m not trying to shame, but the dookie might not be quite high enough in our minds sometimes. Whether it’s your dookie, your pet’s dookie, your other animal’s dookie, we need to respect where that dookie goes. That sounds pretty obvious, but it’s something I wanted to mention for the sake of the water quality in Beaver Creek. Here’s why.
On our tour of the salmon projects on April 15, 2019, our writing class at Mt Hood Community College, WR122:01, encountered the concept of a “story of water.” The class decided to share its stories of water.
