Conservation Center’s Community Float Trip Returns to the North Fork

April 17, 2014 – Every May for the last fifteen years people have flocked from all over the North Fork, the Western Slope, and beyond, to float the river in support of local watershed conservation. The Western Slope Conservation Center’s Annual River Awareness Float Trip Fundraiser is one of Delta County’s most popular and well attended outdoor events. Every year, the organization recruits boat captains and regional conservation experts to take rafters through a restored or improved area on the Gunnison River or North Fork of the Gunnison River. Residents play on the water while learning firsthand about exciting developments in river stewardship.

This year’s float will take place on Saturday May 17^th on the North Fork of the Gunnison River. Rafters will get on the water at Black Bridge Winery above Paonia and take out at the site of the future boat ramp at the Delta County Fairgrounds in Hotchkiss. Families and rafters of all levels are invited to participate. Tickets are $30 for adults and $20 for children and include a shuttle, lunch, a glass of wine (or non-alcoholic beverage), and a Klean Kanteen reusable cup. All proceeds go to support the Conservation Center’s river improvement projects in Delta County. All rafters must register online prior to the float at www.theconservationcenter.org

The Conservation Center has been managing river restoration projects for over two decades. In the past, the Annual River Awareness Float Trip has highlighted restoration projects at the Relief Ditch Diversion Dam (2013), the Hartland Diversion Dam (2012), Midway, Hotchkiss, and the Curry Conservation Easement (2011). Most of the projects have involved reconstructing the river channel where it has been disturbed, and restoring aquatic and riparian habitat in and around the river. During restoration, the river banks and bed are reshaped to reestablish natural flow and reduce bank erosion. Debris that people have used to stabilize banks, like tires or car bodies, as well as dangerous and poorly designed dikes and dams, are removed from the site.

The May 17th float trip will pass through the site of an extensive river restoration at the Paonia River Park. A series of recent restoration projects at the park created 5 acres of wetlands, built new fish habitat, and returned the North Fork to a single meandering channel. Prior to the restoration, the river in Paonia was braided into multiple channels and so wide and shallow that it was barely passable for most boaters, and uninhabitable for fish. Because of the restoration, the river is now narrow and deep enough to be safely boated and to serve as a fishing destination in the late spring and early summer.

Sponsors of the float trip include Black Bridge Winery, Colorado River District, Colorado Water Conservation Board, Mike Jackson – Coldwell Banker Colorado Realty, Delta County Independent, Delta Tourism Cabinet, First National Bank of Colorado in Paonia, Craig Wolverton – Four Seasons Investment Advisors, Gunnison Gorge Anglers, Hotchkiss Community Chamber of Commerce, North Fork Pool Park and Recreation District, Kevin Parks – State Farm Insurance, Pack Shack Printing, RIGS Fly Shop, and SOTAR Whitewater Manufacturing.

For more information and to register for the River Awareness Float Trip visit the www.theconservationcenter.org or call 970-527-5307.

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