Moses Coulee till, up to thick in places. This glacial till, made up of clay, silt, sand, gravel, cobblestones, and erratic boulders, covers most of the upper coulee. Today Moses Coulee supports an excellent example of a shrub-steppe ecoregion. Vegetation includes sagebrush, rabbitbrush, greasewood, hopsage, bitterbrush, bunchgrass, buckwheat and other vegetation once common to most of the Columbia Plateau. The Nature Conservancy has established the Moses Coulee Preserve, which is a contiguous, intact shrub-steppe habitat. It is located south of Jameson Lake near the head of Moses Coulee. It provide habitat for a rich variety of birds (lazuli bunting, common goldeneye, sage
Grand Coulee Dam Grand Coulee Dam (not including the Third Powerplant) to be $168 million; its actual cost was $163 million in 1943 ($ in dollars). Expenses to finish the power stations and repair design flaws with the dam throughout the 1940s and '50s added another $107 million, bringing the total cost to $270 million ($ in dollars), about 33% over estimates. The Third Powerplant was estimated to cost in 1967, but higher construction costs and labor disputes drove the project's final cost in 1973 to ($ in dollars), about 55% over estimates. Despite estimates being exceeded, the dam became an economic success,