Prisoners Harbor of Santa Cruz Island, California, was historically the site of a 4.86-ha coastal wetland and riparian system—the largest on the California Channel Islands. The site was occupied by native people for 3000 years until the 1830s. During the late 1800s, ranchers filled about half of the wetland area to build livestock corrals and other facilities. They also rerouted the main stream channel, Cañada del Puerto, and built a stone wall and earthen berm along its west bank. This disconnected the stream from its floodplain and inadvertently caused erosion of a Native American archeological site. The National Park Service developed a wetland and riparian restoration design for Prisoners Harbor based on topographic and hydrologic analyses and on relationships between vegetation community and depth to water table estimated from neighboring reference wetlands. In 2011, Channel Islands National Park and The Nature Conservancy restored 1.25 ha of coastal wetland and reconnected the stream to its floodplain by removing the earthen berm. This restoration was accomplished by excavating 7645 m3 of fill material and planting the site with over 15,000 native wetland and riparian plants. Postproject vegetation monitoring showed that only one of the 8 planted wetland species had a significant increase in abundance between 2012 and 2013, likely due to severe drought conditions that began soon after project implementation. However, hydrologic monitoring in the first year after restoration showed that the restored marshes met federal criteria for wetland hydrology just before the drought began. These data provide early but promising evidence that our approach to restoration will convert the filled corral area at Prisoners Harbor to functional coastal wetland habitat as more-typical (wetter) precipitation levels return. The restoration also helped to protect the archeological site and is expected to provide an enjoyable and educational destination for visitors.
