Malheur River Wildlife Mitigation Project : 2008 Annual Report.

Abstract

In 1998, the Burns Paiute Tribe (BPT) submitted a proposal to Bonneville Power Administration (BPA) for the acquisition of the Malheur River Wildlife Mitigation Project (Project). The proposed mitigation site was for the Denny Jones Ranch and included Bureau of Land Management (BLM) and Oregon Division of State Lands (DSL) leases and grazing allotments. The Project approval process and acquisition negotiations continued for several years until the BPT and BPA entered into a Memorandum of Agreement, which allowed for purchase of the Project in November 2000. The 31,781 acre Project is located seven miles east of Juntura, Oregon and is adjacent to the Malheur River (Figure 1). Six thousand three hundred eighty-five acres are deeded to BPT, 4,154 acres are leased from DSL, and 21,242 acres are leased from BLM (Figure 2). In total 11 grazing allotments are leased between the two agencies. Deeded land stretches for seven miles along the Malheur River. It is the largest private landholding on the river between Riverside and Harper, Oregon. Approximately 938 acres of senior water rights are included with the Ranch. The Project is comprised of meadow, wetland, riparian and shrub-steppe habitats. The BLM grazing allotment, located south of the ranch, is largely shrub-steppe habitat punctuated by springs and seeps. Hunter Creek, a perennial stream, flows through both private and BLM lands. Similarly, the DSL grazing allotment, which lies north of the Ranch, is predominantly shrub/juniper steppe habitat with springs and seeps dispersed throughout the upper end of draws (Figure 2).