Wishing well.. All creatures great and small.. Exploring legacy natural areas in our backyards

I learned about a new creek in the last month…. With stunning potential!

Percival Creek. A local treasure!

I have driven past its mouth a thousand times:

Driving along Capitol Lake, cross the bumpy train tracks at Marathon Park. Look southwest over the water to the forest. There, Percival Creek enters the cove on Capitol Lake. Historically, steelhead, coho and chinook salmon in fall swam up the stream in that canyon adjoining the railroad tracks, and swam under Cooper Point Road and Highway 101 to reach a fork. Some fish may have gone right towards Black Lake. Fish going left swam past the Hoh Brewery and South Puget Sound Community College. Then onward through the pipe at Sapp Road and Trosper Road and onto Trosper Lake.

 

The 1986 Thurston Regional Planning Council Percival Creek Corridor Plan shares:

“Percival Creek supports both salmon and steelhead spawning in the 1970s” (page 37) “Percival Creek chinook runs averaged 3155 fish per year between 1960 and 1970” “current plan (older) is to raise hatchery origin Chinook fry in the cove (Percival Creek outlet)” (page 19) “open water, wetlands, wooded hillside and open fields provides for a greater diversity and larger wildlife population” “western pond turtle encountered under the BPA transmission line” (page 20) “preservation of these water bodies is essential in creating a high quality living environment in Tumwater” (page 36) “over half the known peat deposits in the County occur in the Percival Creek to Black Lake area” (page 36) “very little development should be permitted” (page 37) ‘What occurs in the upper reach affects the lower 2 reaches” (page 53) “What happens to the wetland is critical issue and changes will effect the hydrology which may result in adverse downstream impacts” (Squaxin tribe comment on page 52).

Interpretive maps near a trail where Sapp road crosses Percival Creek may answer some of your questions.

Mapping of the Black Lake area claimed the area for people. But what did they see in the 1850s?

Time travel! Find Black Lake, Percival Creek, Deschutes River and the swamp on both maps.

The swamp and environs not only supports a rare bog, streamflows for salmon and possibly drinking water of the lower Deschutes, but also the only known Oregon spotted frogs surviving in a Urban Growth Area. Can both humans and wildlife survive in a UGA? Time will tell.

Bonnie Blessing enjoys exploring our local watersheds.

Sources:

USGS 1999. Conceptual model and numerical simulation of the Ground-Water Flow System in the Unconsolidated Sediments of Thurston County, Washington. (https://pubs.usgs.gov/wri/wri994165/pdf/wrir994165.pdf (pages 2 and 29 to 30).

WA Dept of Ecology 2007. Assessment of the Surface Water and Groundwater Inteactions in the Deschutes and Percival Creek Watersheds, Thurston County WA. https://apps.ecology.wa.gov/publications/documents/0703002.pdf

WA Dept of Ecology 2021. Deschutes Restoration and Enhancements Plan https://squaxinisland.org/wp/wp-content/uploads/2022/06/WRIA13-WREC-FinalDraftPlan-March2021.pdf

WA Dept of Ecology Critical Aquifer Recharge Area Guidance (page 43 of

https://apps.ecology.wa.gov/publications/documents/0510028.pdf

City of Tumwater Wellhead Protection Plan Section 7 and 8 of

https://apps.ecology.wa.gov/publications/documents/1203223.pdf

USFWS 2023. Draft recovery plan of the Oregon spotted Frog

https://www.fws.gov/story/2023-03/service-seeks-public-comment-draft-recovery-plan-oregon-spotted-frog