Screening-level causal assessment tool successfully applied in San Luis Rey River watershed

SCCWRP and its partners have completed a screening-level causal assessment of the San Luis Rey River watershed in San Diego County using an approach co-developed by SCCWRP that rapidly identifies likely stressors affecting the health of the watershed’s biological communities.

The work, completed in June in partnership with the City of Oceanside and the County of San Diego, utilized the Rapid Screening Causal Assessment (RSCA) tool to examine five types of stressors that could be responsible for degraded stream health: altered habitat, elevated conductivity, elevated temperature, eutrophication and altered flows.

Researchers identified altered flow and altered habitats as the most common potential causes for stream degradation.

The RSCA assessment will be followed by a pair of more in-depth causal assessments that provide additional insights and improve management confidence that the stressors responsible for biological degradation have been correctly identified.