River Channel Migration in the Teanaway Community Forest, Washington, from 1954 to 2013

The purpose of this project was to analyze river channel migration in the North, Middle, and West Forks of the Teanaway River located in the Teanaway Community Forest, in north central Washington to determine the amount of change that has occurred from 1954 to 2013. Tracking this change in the Teanaway Community Forest is important to decipher what kinds of restoration can be done in the floodplain to help riparian growth. Using geographic information systems (GIS), aerial photographs from five different years were georeferenced to a National Agriculture Imagery Program (NAIP) image of Kittitas County to account for a sixty year time period with approximately 10 years between each set of photographs. Only images where the river is present and located within the boundary of the Teanaway Community Forest were used in the georeferencing process. The river channels were then digitized from each year and compared to each time period to get an idea of migration and width changes. Areas of large change over the time period were selected and individual maps were made of each of these areas. Preliminary analysis shows that areas with small changes in river channel migration between 1954 and 1978 encountered large changes in channel migration by 2013. Knowing these areas of small and large change will help to focus restoration projects in the Community Forest