Site preparation has begun for construction of the new Olympic National Park greenhouse in Robin Hill Farm County Park.

The $358,000 project is part of the Elwha River dams removal and river restoration project. It will include a greenhouse, tool shed, cold frames and nursery beds.

The 195-acre Robin Hill County Park is located off Dryke Road just north of U.S. Highway 101 between Port Angeles and Sequim.

The greenhouse is being built on a five-acre site within 20 acres currently maintained for pasture management.

The work is being done by Northcon, Inc., of Hayden, Idaho, a Native American-owned general contractor that has worked in Washington, Idaho, Montana, Oregon and Wyoming since 1992.

The three-year Elwha River dams removal project will begin in 2011 – one year earlier due to federal stimulus funding – and cost an estimated $308 million.

After the Elwha and Glines Canyon dams are removed, draining Lake Aldwell and Lake Mills, hundreds of thousands of native plants from the new greenhouse will be used to restore native vegetation to the Elwha valley.

The new greenhouse and nursery will improve the park’s already highly successful native plant revegetation program, recognized as one of the best in the Pacific Northwest.

Since its beginning in 1987, the program has produced more than 400,000 native plants for restoring damaged areas throughout the park, including the Seven Lakes Basin, Lake Constance, Hurricane Ridge and several sites along the wilderness coast.

Reach Brian Gawley at bgawley@sequimgazette.com.