Instream Flows for Recreation: A Handbook on Concepts and Research Methods

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In this handbook, we try to summarize some of the things we have discovered through our work. Not meant to be the final word on a field which is developing rapidly, our goal is to help establish a framework for bringing the field into maturity. Flows are a major ingredient in the river recreation recipe, but important as they are, it is surprising how little we know about them. In a world where no resource can be taken for granted, the recreation industry, planners, and the public are going to have to become much smarter about instream flows and the values that depend on them. There are many competing uses for the water in our rivers and policy makers are allocating and will continue to allocate water from them. Good allocation decisions -- decisions that include consideration of all the impacts — will only be made with better information about those impacts. With this book, we hope to outline the steps toward providing that information for recreation. We have many to thank for their help with this book. Institutional and research support for the handbook itself was provided by the College of Forestry at Oregon State University and the National Park Service's Rivers and Trails Conservation Program, while the studies upon which the book is based were also supported by the Bureau of Reclamation, the Bureau of Land Management, the National Park Service, the U.S Forest Service, the U.S Fish and Wildlife Service, the State of Alaska Department of Natural Resources, and the State of Alaska Department of Fish and Game. The handbook benefited from reviews of researchers, resource managers, and agency policy- makers, including Bern Collins, Thomas Brown, Bruce DiGennaro, Christopher Estes, Dan Haas, Tracy Miller, Jack Mosby, Dan Muller, Drew Parkin, Peter Skinner, Angie Torres, and Owen Williams. Finally, numerous ideas in the handbook came from discussions with our colleagues on various instream flow studies. Co- researchers included Stan Carrick, Dave Ellerbroeck, Mary Lu Harle, Ron Huntsinger, Lon Kelly, Jon Kostoryhs, Larry McDonnell, Tony Martinez, Dennis Murphy, Don Prichard, Bunny Sterin, Jonathan Taylor, Steve Vandas, and Bruce Van Haveren.