The beautiful trout streams in south-central Idaho’s Wood River Valley are popular with fishermen, but challenges exist. The Big Wood River is heavily used, and the habitat needs management and care. Several Silver Creek tributaries require habitat restoration and fish passage structures to help mitigate the effects of previous land practices and barriers to fish migration. Organizations like Trout Unlimited, the Wood River Land Trust, and the Nature Conservancy, as well as private landowners, have already completed several key restoration projects to improve fish habitat and water quality. But there is more work to do.

This two-part workday will benefit both of the valley’s river systems. In the morning, volunteers will ready a popular fishing access point at Boxcar Bend on the Big Wood River for the season ahead. They'll be pulling noxious weeds, mulching a trail, and planting native willows, dogwoods, and water birch in the riparian zone to keep the banks shaded and stable. In the afternoon, our film crew will meet up with middle school students from Ketchum, Idaho, who have been learning about stream health through TU’s Adopt-a-Trout curriculum. The kids will perform insect sampling in a previously restored section of Loving Creek, monitor water quality, assess native vegetation, and provide data to the Nature Conservancy.