Big Thompson Wildfire/Watershed Assessment
We have completed the Big Thompson Wildfire/Watershed Assessment. The assessment follows a procedure prescribed by the Colorado Watershed Protection Data Refinement Work Group titled “Protecting Critical Watersheds in Colorado from Wildfire: A Technical Approach to Watershed Assessment and Prioritization”.
The Big Thompson Wildfire/Watershed Assessment identifies, prioritizes, and recommends measures to protect those watersheds that provide or convey critical community water supplies from the adverse effects of post-wildfire hydrologic changes, including flooding, erosion, debris flows, and deposition. We also completed an opportunities and constraints analysis to identify potential next steps for watershed protection.
One of the goals of this assessment is to gather the key stakeholders together to communicate the suggested process, listen to any suggested changes, and build collaborative support for the assessment process. This process involves looking at the watershed zones of concern and identifying opportunity areas. Remember that this process is focused on hazards to water supply.
The basic analysis for the Big Thompson Watershed was completed as part of the Bark Beetle Incident work (see link on the side bar). Based on feedback and review from the first meeting some of the analysis/maps have changes slightly (see Results Blog for details). The Final Assessment Report is available on the project files page, see sidebar.
Please contact Brad Piehl for further information.
Big Thompson Watershed Stakeholders;
Thank you for your work and help making this project a success.