Since the late 1800’s, numerous dikes, canals, drains, and water control structures have been installed across the basin to facilitate the diversion of water for the benefit of grazing and farming. With diversions, flows are intercepted and channels are dewatered often leaving no flow to reach Malheur and Harney Lakes during dry years.The extent and distribution of snow melt to flood-irrigated wet meadows and the size and spatial dynamics of Harney and Malheur Lakes, as terminal lakes, depend on annual precipitation. Timing and duration of runoff is affected by the snowpack accumulation and melt. While annual weather is unpredictable and always has been, there are increasingly variable patterns of precipitation related to climate change. Less snow and more rain has resulted in earlier spring freshet events and less late season runoff into Malheur Lake. Water management decisions affect both the extent of flood-irrigated wet meadows and the rate, duration, and timing of flooding of the floodplain meadows.

HBWC has supported stream channel enhancements designed to raise the bed elevation which will consequently raise the water table. An elevated water table contributes to the maintenance and increase in the area of flood-irrigated wet meadows. This outcome contributes to improving the profitability of forage production on private lands and the development of habitat quality necessary for migrating waterbirds on private and Malheur National Wildlife Refuge lands and therefore contributing to the increased use and abundance of target birds of flood-irrigated wet meadows across the Harney Basin. An elevated water table also increases the duration and discharge of water in stream systems that support habitat necessary for sustaining native fish populations and increased resiliency in the face of climate change.