Nooksack River Geography

The Nooksack watershed encompasses 778 sq miles.1 The Puget Sound watershed borders it on the downstream side. It is bordered on the upstream side by the Fraser watershed to the north. It is bordered to the west by the Strait of Georgia watershed. The watershed includes portions of Whatcom and Skagit Counties. The principal urban area is Bellingham. Two tribes are located in the watershed, Lummi and Nooksack.

USGS Cataloging Unit: 17110004 (click image for detailed view)

The Nooksack watershed (HUC 17110004) includes:

Nooksack River2

Nooksack River (click image for detailed view)

Long before Europeans began moving into the Pacific Northwest, American Indians had already developed a rich culture along the area's riverbanks and shorelines. The salmon in the Nooksack River and the shellfish in Bellingham Bay sustained them, as they would white settlers during the 19th and 20th centuries. The city of Deming grew where the North, Middle and South forks of the Nooksack join, before winding through Everson, Lynden, Ferndale, and Bellingham.

Today the Nooksack River runs through almost every major township in Whatcom County. Its water irrigates fields, nurses salmon, and, because of a diversion completed in 1962, bathes and satiates more than 85,700 county residents who draw water from Lake Whatcom. The river defines this community more than Mount Baker or Bellingham Bay, yet the community raised on it may be the river's undoing.

Violations of standards for fecal coliform, ammonia, and dissolved oxygen were documented in 1997 and 1998 through extensive sampling of the Nooksack River and key tributaries. In June 2000, the Washington Department of Ecology established fecal coliform pollution limits for the Nooksack watershed through adoption of its "total maximum daily load" (TMDL) analysis.

In 1888, most of the stream flow from the Nooksack River flowed through the Lummi River to Lummi Bay. Near the turn of the century, the Nooksack switched course when a log jam plugged the channel to Lummi Bay. At present, the Lummi River receives an occasional small amount of flood-stage overflow from the Nooksack River. Unlike the Nooksack delta, which continues to build new wetland habitats in Bellingham Bay, dikes to develop land for farming and aquaculture have significantly modified the Lummi delta. Reduced sediment input from the river has led to regression of the shoreline. Breaching or removal of dike systems could restore parts of this system.

Nooksack River

North Fork
The jewel of the North Cascades is the North Fork of the Nooksack. This river is born at the base of the Nooksack Glacier, high on Mt. Shuksan. After mixing with many side creeks and tumbling over Nooksack Falls, this river's glacial silt laden water enters the upper gorge of the Nooksack.3

North Fork

Middle Fork
The source of water for the Middle Fork is a combination of direct surface runoff, discharge of ground-water, and glacial melt. Much of its water is diverted via pipeline to Lake Whatcom, which is used as the municipal water supply for the City of Bellingham.

South Fork
The lower South Fork of the Nooksack River has become a major focus for restoration. The South Fork's naturally low gradient through the lowland reaches created an environment where log jams spanning the river were once common, as were numerous sloughs and side channels networking across an expansive floodplain. These were conditions favorable for a variety of salmonid species (species in the family Salmonidae). Over time, human activities have translated into significant habitat degradation. Large-scale timber harvest extending to the banks of the river, extensive channel clearing for flood control and navigation, diking, draining, and roads have resulted in profound changes in how the river looks and functions. Logging and stream cleanout of large wood have caused losses of instream cover, channel complexity and stability, deep pools, and of floodplain habitats. Diking, while allowing development, has added to habitat problems in some of the same ways, leading to loss of shade and floodplain habitats. The South Fork does not have a glacial source as does the North Fork, and lack of shade along its banks has caused higher water temperatures, which results in thermal stress to fish. Landslides associated with logging and roads have occurred throughout the watershed, causing sedimentation of spawning beds and pools, and causing some streams to flow subsurface during a longer portion of the year. The South Fork is designated an impaired water body by the Washington Department of Ecology because of excessive fine sediment, high temperatures, and low in-stream flows.4

South Fork

Back to Top

Nooksack River Delta

The Nooksack delta is less than 100 years old and continues to grow -- or prograde -- out into Bellingham Bay. Because it formed so recently, it is the least altered by human activities in the Puget Sound region. The shoreline, salt marsh, and tideflats, if allowed to develop naturally without filling, dredging, or development, could retain the benefits of valuable fish and wildlife habitat. Increases in intertidal habitat on the Nooksack delta could offset sea grass losses of up to 30% that occurred in Bellingham Bay due to commercial and industrial development (Thom and Hallum 1990).5

Back to Top

Glacier Creek

Glacier Creek is a tributary of the North Fork of the Nooksack River and has an undeveloped power potential of 2500 Kw. The creek enters the North Fork at the town of Glacier, which is the last settlement along Mount Baker Highway before entering the national forest. The town of Glacier is just inside the Mount Baker National Recreation Area, and north of the Mount Baker Wilderness Area. The town is about 65 miles east of Bellingham.

Glacier Creek

Back to Top

Canyon Creeks

There are two Canyon Creeks in the Nooksack watershed. The first is Canyon Creek North, which enters the North Fork of the Nooksack from the north just below the town of Glacier. The second is Canyon Creek South, a tributary of the Middle Fork of the Nooksack. The creeks have an undeveloped power potential of 6.1Mw [Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (FERC# 04312)].

Back to Top

Fishtrap Creek

The Fishtrap Creek watershed, a tributary to the Nooksack River in northwestern Washington, is dominated by dairy farming. Fifteen sites in mainstem Fishtrap Creek and its tributaries were surveyed for conventional water quality parameters six times between September 1993 and January 1994. The water quality investigation results showed high to very high levels of fecal coliform bacteria throughout the watershed (as high as 880,000 organisms/100 mL), low levels of dissolved oxygen in the small tributaries (as low as 2.2 mg/L), and one instance of very high ammonia levels (19.2 mg/L NH3-N).6

Since 1990, through matching grants and the volunteer base, the Nooksack Salmon Enhancement Association (NSEA) has been working to restore self-sustaining salmon runs in the county through habitat restoration, scientific monitoring, community education, and salmon stock production.

Erin Harwood, volunteer coordinator with NSEA, said that a count of returning salmon on Fishtrap Creek in the fall of 2001 yielded encouraging numbers. At three separate spots from Lynden to the Canadian border, counters found 245 chinook salmon and 35 redds (spawning areas), 52 cohos and five redds, and 16 chums and one redd.7

Fishtrap Creek

Back to Top

Bertrand Creek

The major portion of Bertrand Creek flows from across the British Columbia border to become a tributary to the Nooksack River.

Past data from Bertrand Creek has shown that while Bertrand Creek provides only 2.8 percent of the Nooksack River waterflow, it was contributing 24.8 percent of the annual fecal coliform bacteria load. Over the years, a number of groups have worked in the Bertrand Creek watershed. The Whatcom Conservation District (WCD) has developed a Stream Team program to increase environmental awareness regarding the creek. The team monitors water quality and improves communication among residents of the watershed and groups who have worked in the watershed.8

Bertrand Creek

Back to Top

Tenmile Creek

Tenmile Creek is the last major tributary in the lowlands of the Nooksack River and is a site for salmon restoration. The Tenmile Creek Watershed Volunteer Riparian Restoration Project was an early action project under the Whatcom County Water Resources Inventory Area No.1 (WRIA1) Watershed Management Plan process.

The objective of the early action project was to provide seed money to set the stage for a larger three-year pilot program. The Tenmile Creek Watershed Project is a community-based effort to improve water quality in the rivers, streams, and ditches that run through an individual's property. It is a commonsense approach to match the landowner's land use and management needs and the community's desire and need to improve water quality. The goal of the program is to improve the health of streams, including wildlife habitat, while maintaining the ability to farm and work the land.9

Back to Top

References Cited

1. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA). Surf Your Watershed: Nooksack. <http://cfpub.epa.gov/surf/huc.cfm?huc_code=17110004>

2. Pulkinnen, Levi. Editor in Chief. The Planet Online Edition. Source to Sea: The Nooksack River. Winter 2002. <http://planet.wwu.edu/winter02/winter02_intro.htm >

3. Alpine Adventures' Wild & Scenic River Tours. Nooksack River. <http://www.alpineadventures.com/nooksack.html>

4. Whatcom Conservation District. South Fork Nooksack River Restoration. <http://www.whatcomcd.org/Publications/Newsletters/
newsletter/winter01/text/South_fork_Nooksack_restoration.htm>

5. People for Puget Sound. The Loss of Habitat in Puget Sound. <http://www.pugetsound.org/habitat/reportfolder/r12nooksacklummi.html>

6. Washington State Department of Ecology. Fishtrap Creek Total Maximum Daily Load Study. <http://www.ecy.wa.gov/biblio/95328.html>

7. Bratt, Calvin. Lynden Tribune editor. March 20, 2002. Salmon get helping hand from volunteer group. <http://www.orcanetwork.org/habitat/lynden.html>

8. Whatcom Conservation District. Stream Team. <http://www.whatcomcd.org/Education/StreamTeam/StreamTeam.htm>

9. Water Resource Inventory Area No. 1 (WRIA 1) Watershed Management Project. Tenmile Creek Watershed. <http://www.wria1project.wsu.edu/documents/eai-tenmile.PDF>