TULALIP – In a few years, visitors are unlikely to recognize the 10 acres of land near Quil Ceda Village that used to be part of a larger Boeing Co. test site and a federal ammunition depot.

The Tulalip Tribes are engaged in an ambitious program to restore the area to a wetland and wildlife habitat, despite the major development going on around it.

In addition to the wetland restoration, the Tulalips have set aside 720 adjacent acres as a forest and watershed preserve. That land contains 130- to 140-year-old trees the Tulalips call the “ancient ones.”

The project will include creating a native plant nursery where trees and shrubbery for the restoration will be grown. The tribes also hope to expand the nursery into a future commercial venture that supplies native plants to government agencies and others for road and restoration projects, said Darryl Williams, the Tulalip Tribes’ environmental liaison.

Two tribal employees have begun working on the nursery, which will grow about 130 different types of plants, including shrubs, trees and berry vines. Some of the plants are used in tribal cultural and religious rituals, and have become hard to find, Williams said.

The wetland restoration project has no price tag yet but is expected to cost tens of thousands of dollars, said Kurt Nelson, the Tulalips’ fish and wildlife resource scientist.

During the 1940s and ’50s, the U.S. Defense Department used the land commonly called the Boeing test site for ammunition testing and storage. In the process, the government drained the surrounding wetlands and created a 1,500-acre grid of roads and ditches that laid waste to salmon and trout spawning areas. Boeing later used the land for testing jet engines. Work done on the site over those two decades left the land and water contaminated.

The soil has since been cleaned, and work is in progress to restore the groundwater to a healthier state, said Jeff Shaw, a Northwest Indian Fisheries Commission spokesman.

In spite of the degradation, some salmon have continued to return to the site, Williams said. In 2001, hundreds of chum salmon fought their way into the ditch system to spawn, only to have that success thwarted by deteriorated habitat, Shaw said. Last fall, the Tulalips laid gravel in the spawning area, but there was so little water that chum and coho created only six salmon nests.

“We know salmon and cutthroat trout are using these channels,” Nelson said. “Improving the habitat that exists and opening up new channels will give the area’s fish populations a real boost.”

The project already has produced some successes. Roads and culverts that blocked fish passage have been removed and culverts replaced to open up about a mile of habitat, Shaw said. The work still to come will create about a half-mile of stream channel and enhance the wetland.

The Tulalips intend to connect the wetland to Coho and Sturgeon creeks, thus re-establishing an ecosystem for fish and wildlife. Although it never will completely return to original natural state, it can become a high-quality environment, Nelson said.

The Tulalips hope to complete the work within three years, but will continue to monitor it after the restoration is complete, Shaw said.

Reporter Cathy Logg: 425-339-3437 or logg@heraldnet.com.