Two Special Southern Oregon Creeks
Jessie Thomas-Blate, Coordinator, Most Endangered Rivers
April 25, 2013 | Most Endangered Rivers, Water Pollution
Today’s guest blog about the #8 Rough & Ready and Baldface Creeks- a part of our America’s Most Endangered Rivers® series- is from Zachary Collier, owner of the Northwest Rafting Company in Hood River, Oregon. Zachary is an avid paddler working on a multi-year project to document the wild area in and around the Kalmiopsis Wilderness.
Take Action to Protect the
Rough & Ready Creek
Tell the Obama Administration to protect the pristine waters of the Rough and Ready and Baldface Creeks!
Rough & Ready Creek and Baldface Creek are the most amazing streams you’ve probably never heard of. They both flow through an area of exposed peridotite in southern Oregon, and share a common ridgeline. Rough & Ready Creek flows south into the well-known Wild and Scenic Illinois River, upstream of the commonly boated Illinois River Canyon. Baldface Creek flows west into the North Fork of the Smith River, which later enters California and the spectacular Smith River system.
I discovered both of these creeks while looking at maps for new places to paddle in southern
Oregon. Both are just south of the rugged Kalmiopsis Wilderness, and are part of a larger area of wild lands where few roads exist to provide access. After learning more about their unique beauty, a few of us decided to make the effort to hike kayaks into these drainages to see them first hand (read our Rough & Ready Creek and Baldface Creek trip reports for the story and photos).
Each time I visit the area in and around the Kalmiopsis Wilderness, I come back passionate about this one-of-a-kind region. It’s rare to find large areas of exposed peridotite on the Earth’s surface. At first glance, the surrounding landscape resembles Mars with its unique red rocks. Plants and trees seem sparse, which is uncommon for southern Oregon. Peridotite is relatively rich in heavy metals and lacks important elements, like nitrogen, that plants need for survival.
But under closer inspection, you begin to see many unique signs of life. In fact, the peridotite landscape these creeks flow through has the highest concentration of rare and endemic plants in Oregon. A good example is the Darlingtonia californica— a rare carnivorous plant that digest insects as its adaptation to the lack of nitrogen. It is also home to the famous Port-Orford-cedar, which only grows in southern Oregon. The Port-Orford-cedar is world-famous for its strength, fire resistance, and rot resistance, but they’re sadly threatened by the Port-Orford-cedar root disease. This disease has been spread by wet vehicle tires around many of the rivers and creeks in southern Oregon, but Rough & Ready Creek and Baldface Creek are thus far unaffected.
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© Zachary Collier
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© Daniel Wakefield Pasley
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© Daniel Wakefield Pasley
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© Zachary Collier
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© Zachary Collier
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© Zachary Collier
Unfortunately, the peridotite soil is also very popular among nickel miners. The rising cost of nickel and other minerals has increased the interest in large-scale nickel mines that would devastate the water quality of these creeks, harm the delicate landscape, and promote the spread of the Port-Orford-cedar root disease. Mining has been an ongoing threat to these unique creeks and the only way for them to receive permanent protection is for Congress or the President to remove these creeks from mineral entry.
Oregon’s Senators Wyden and Merkley, along with Oregon’s Representative DeFazio, have asked the Secretary of the Interior to remove these creeks from mineral entry every year from 2009 to 2011. Please join us to help spur Congress or the President to permanently protect these creeks from mining.
Learn more about these special creeks at RoughandReadyCreek.org.
Lend your voice to tell Congress and the Secretaries of Interior and Agriculture to protect this special place from nickel mining!
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Comments List
Submitted by Barbara at: April 26, 2013
El Dorado’s comment is one often used by proponents of mining and continuing old but ruinous ways. It doesn’t take into account the enormous costs of modern mining to the environment, the taxpayer and communities. For example the tiny town of Libby, Montana, an EPA Superfund Site, is still living with the contamination from a long closed vermiculite mine. Officially 200 deaths and 1,0000 illnesses were attributed to the contamination in 2009. The number is likely greater now because mesothelioma has a long onset period. On a smaller scale, the neighbors of Glenbrook Nickel’s import facility at Coos Bay, Oregon had to bring a class action lawsuit against the company to get relief, after they’d suffered years of the red dust from the company’s nickel laterite crushing, drying and transport operation coating everything in and around their homes and the resulting ill health effects. The thing is we know better now and there are ways forward. USGS reports that about 95,000 tons of nickel was recovered from scrap in 2012. This represented about 43% of secondary consumption plus primary consumption. I paid more for a computer that can mostly be recycled and upgrade as long as possible rather than purchasing new. Finally, I would suggest to El Dorado that without clean water to drink and air to breath, the life that we enjoy wouldn’t be possible at all and that these are more precious that the small amount of nickel that would be gained at Rough and Ready Creek and Baldface Creek.
Submitted by David Moryc at: April 26, 2013
El Dorado-Thanks for your comment. American Rivers isn't categorically opposed to mining as long as it is done in an environmentally safe manner and in appropriate areas. We feel strongly that large-scale nickel mines are certainly NOT appropriate for the Illinois and Smith Rivers--two of the last remaining, ecologically rich, pristine wild river systems in the United States.
Submitted by El Dorado at: April 26, 2013
Without mining your life would not be the same, you would not even have a vehicle to get you to these spots, let alone use a computer and camera to post pictures and your hatred of mining
Submitted by Barbara at: April 26, 2013
I want to thank Zach and Daniel Wakefield Pasley for going the extra mile to provide the public with gorgeous winter photos of these wild but threatened creeks. The cold December day they paddled the South Fork of Rough and Ready Creek, was the worst snowstorm in Southwest Oregon's recent history. The interstate was shut down both ways but they didn't turn back. With J. R. Weir, they hiked their kayaks into the South Kalmiopsis Roadless Area and paddled the South Fork and mainstem of Rough and Ready Creek during the worst of the storm. Zach brief email tells it all: "It was snowing like crazy, ridiculously beautiful and fun." I hope their herculean efforts to bring us glimpses of the untempered wild nature of this unique landscape inspire you to take action to protect it and its endangered rivers.
Submitted by Robert DeSapio at: April 26, 2013
Save our precious waterways from the destruction wrought by mining! I'm asking that Congress, and the Secretaries of Interior and Agriculture permanently protect Rough and Ready and Baldface creeks from mining!