The Living Systems Approach: Compost Based BMPs to Revitalize Disturbed Soils

摘要

In 1999, several species of Puget Sound salmon were officially listed by the federal government as threatened under the Endangered Species Act. The Puget Sound region includes 12 counties and 18 watersheds from the Canadian border south to Olympia, Washington. A significant cause of the decline in the Puget Sound Chinook salmon and the bull trout was urbanization and the resulting surface water runoff that directly degraded the salmon habitat, especially their spawning grounds in the region's streams. In response to the salmon becoming an endangered species as a result of stream and river degradation due to runoff, the Washington Organic Recycling Council (WORC) launched the Soils For Salmon campaign. At the heart of the campaign was the critical need to retain native soils and/or repair damaged soils, using compost and mulch, so that surface water from storm events could infiltrate the soil.