The Bull Run Watershed

The Bull Run watershed is an integral part of the region's heritage and legacy. Because of its outstanding water quality and level of protection, the Bull Run has been listed among a handful of outstanding sources of water in the United States for more than a century.

On June 17, 1892 , President Benjamin Harrison established the 142,000-acre Bull Run Forest Reserve. Water from Bull Run was first supplied to Portland on January 2, 1895 . Between 1904 and the early 1960s, the City continued to develop water supply facilities in the Bull Run basin, adding modern diversion structures, treatment facilities, storage reservoirs and three transmission conduits to the original system.

Did you know that:

• About 96% of the Bull Run watershed is federally owned and managed and 4% is owned and managed by the City of Portland.
• The watershed drains about 102 square miles of forested landscape. 
• Over 250 species of mammals, birds, reptiles, amphibians and fish may occur in the watershed, according to an Oregon Department of Forestry review of Oregon's forest habitats.  
• Almost 53% of the watershed is classified as 'old growth' and has never been logged.
• Rain, not snowmelt, provides 90-95% of the water in the watershed, averaging 130 inches a year!