Construction delays Skagit bird hunts

DOUG HUDDLE

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Construction activity on the Wiley Slough restoration will delay to Saturday, Oct. 4, the opening of pheasant hunting at the Washington Department of Fish and Wildlife's Skagit Wildlife Area Headquarters Unit on Fir Island.

Pheasants slated for release for the youth hunt, seniors' hunt and the opening week of the general season at the 175-acre Headquarters Unit instead will be released in the SWA's Samish Unit southwest of Edison and on Leque Island, west of Stanwood.

Weekly pheasant stocking on the Headquarters designated release site will resume Friday, Oct. 3, on the usual evening schedule Fridays, Saturdays and Tuesdays through the end of the season.

The Headquarters Unit also will not be available for waterfowl hunting for tomorrow's start of the two-day youth bird hunt nor will the boat launch on nearby Freshwater Slough be open, said Manager John Garrett of the Skagit Wildlife Area.

Waterfowlers may still use the bayfront areas of the Skagit delta, which must be access by boat, by launching at the Skagit County Parks and Recreation Department's Conway ramp under the east side of the Fir Island Road bridge. The Milltown boat launch off Pioneer Highway south of Conway also will be open.

Youth duck hunters with their escorts also can get to several bayfront locations on foot via the department's North Fork (Rawlins Road, Fir Island), Jensen (Maupin Road, Fir Island) and Big Ditch (Pioneer Highway, mainland) accesses.

The Wiley Slough project will restore 160 acres of Skagit River delta to natural processes that should aid recovery of native chinook runs in the system. The reclamation project consists of removing old dikes built in 1962, constructing a new set-back levee in land to protect Fir Island farmlands and installing new tide gates for upland drainage channels.

The department-owned Skagit Wildlife Area is comprised of 16,708 acres of upland, river riparian, estuary and intertidal habitats from the Samish River south to the Stillagaumish River delta at Stanwood.