The last time you moseyed the meanders along what the folks down at the Provo River Restoration Project like to call “Reach 6,” it was mid-summer 2005 and within a week of being closed-off to public access, so that further construction of secondary channels and wetland ponds could get underway.
Back then, it was summertime and the strollin’ was easy – fish were jumpin’ and the grasses grew high. Although the comfort zone lent itself quite well to the lazy excursion, it didn’t take a habitat conservationist to know that this particular stretch of river flowed in other than a natural state. Even though time had smoothed the contours, signs of man’s intrusions were very much in evidence.
So, they shut the place down and brought in the heavy equipment and, through additional assault, set about the process of surface restoration. The actual healing of the ecosystem, of course, would involve a more natural series of changes.
In the meantime, however, dirt and river rock have again been displaced, and what was once an easy poke-along ramble is now more of an exercise in route finding. These days, traipsing the stretch of the Provo River downstream from the bridge along River Road a short ways up from U.S. 40 lends itself more toward the wading garb of the fly fisherman than to the shorts and sandals of summers past.
And, although the project is expected to be completed this year, it’s hard tellin’, not knowin’. Currently, on the earlier portions of the trek, long unhooked pipe sections lay upon the ground in a fashion that suggests re-vegetation of some sort or, possibly, a snowmaking system for a new upscale streamside snowshoe resort.
Further on down, a series of wetland ponds dot the corridor. They are a work in progress, of course, as are the reconfigured, secondary channels. For the PRRP, it’s about mimicking historic conditions including setting levees back to where a “near natural flood plain” is created. This would allow the river to change course naturally.
All this is highly interesting if not jaunt-friendly. But, then again, they never said they were setting about to make this a theme park for roving ramblers of the human persuasion — unless, of course, they toss artificial bugs tied to the end of a tippet, which has been secured by some arcane knot to a four-weight flyline.
And they’re out there already, these fly-fisherfolk, bedecked in waders and their self-contained vests full of nippers, clippers, forceps, leaders, leader straighteners, thermometers, magnifying glasses, fly dressing, split-shot, nymphs, dry flies, energy bars, water bottles, cell phones, wader repair kits, cigar repair kits, flask repair kits and the ever-present net that hangs so casually down the back.
And it’s probably best that hiking-friendliness is very much secondary to the cause. “Reach-6” will be crowded enough as it is with anglers and, that in itself, not unlike the cow trails of Butte, Montana evolving into streets, should serve to provide trails sufficient for the amateur naturalists among us. So what if you do get a little bit wet?
But these discussions certainly border on the premature. By the looks of things, it is not unimaginable to perceive a scenario wherein additional large-scale closures are implemented along the corridor this spring. This would more-than-likely include the stretch in question, as “Reach-6” appears to be the one with the most work yet-to-be-completed.
As with wandering any wetland, the secret, in the main, is footwear, and whether or not wading is an issue. In this particular instance, at least until re-vegetation is complete, keeping to the streambeds themselves and the small trails already evolving alongside their banks seem the best way to go.
That way you not only are closer to the riparian action, as it were, but also not involved in the creation of un-natural habitat, like you would be if your tramping were to aid and abet the erosion process. They might as well allow the grazing of cattle with its inherent devastation to the streamside ecosystem.
As of now, the restoration program along this section of River Road remains pretty much a work in progress. If inspecting changes to the terrain while construing how they will affect the river at various levels of runoff is the goal, the uninitiated will see mostly chaos – any method-to-madness ratio existing only in the eyes of the beholder.
It’s this “off-channel” habitat re-introduction, however, that provides the most interest. It is within these ponds and old-channel cutoffs that support for such native fish species as mottled sculpin, mountain whitefish, Utah sucker, longnose dace, speckled dace, mountain sucker and redside shiner is most prevalent.
The Mitigation Commission, which oversees much of this restoration, also funds projects for sage grouse and spotted frogs and is part of the “June Sucker Recovery Team.” Biodiversity rocks! Something about the name “June Sucker” connotes a bottom-feeder. It is very much doubtful they would “rise” to a mayfly. But, who knows?
It should be mentioned, however, that even on an overcast and blustery afternoon, while negotiating old and new meanders through a completely torn-up and re-defined, once-familiar river course, there are possibilities aplenty to hear again the songs of water, earth, sun and wind.
Along the corridor, reasons for rapture remain. They’re in the sensory overload of early spring and will multiply with time. They are in the coming of midges and the pale morning dun and the stonefly. They are soaring with the red-tail hawks and teetering on the stream bank with the broad-headed cicadas.
Who knows when “Reach-6” will fulfill its destiny and join the rest of the middle Provo in becoming the sanctuary for diversity that it once was? In the meantime, however, there should be plenty of reasons to wander and wade — unless, of course, herds of yellow iron machines return to roam the corridor and, once again, they close it off to the public.
If and when that becomes the case, there are always additional “reaches” to roam and stretches to stroll along the middle Provo River between Jordanelle and Deer Creek. A healing side to the Central Utah Project? Whoda thunkit? Anyway, in a few short months, the whole place should return to that garden state that is part of its design. Restoration rules!