<p>Estuaries support critical ecological functions and processes. Restoration of estuarine habitats seeks to improve or repair physical conditions and processes, and to provide benefits to aquatic organisms. However, the trajectory of response for restoring degraded features can take years to achieve which results in uncertainty regarding when benefits to organisms will occur. We investigated the response of invertebrate assemblages and juvenile Chinook salmon foraging at hydrologically reconnected tidal wetland channels in the Columbia River estuary, U.S.A. We implemented a paired design where results from four restoration sites were compared to results from corresponding reference sites. Our analyses include hierarchical models to examine variations in salmon diet structure and three invertebrate community assemblages sampled within a wetland channel – benthic, upper water column, and wetland channel margin. Generalized additive models were used to predict total log-scale fish diet biomass as a function of spatial, temporal, and fish-level factors. Seasonality and location were primary sources of variation in the biological communities examined. We also found evidence of differences in invertebrate assemblages and fish foraging characteristics between restoration and reference sites in tidal wetlands, but the distinction between site-type (restoration, reference) was not a predominant factor and the effect of restoration differed by response variable. In our study, regardless of effect size, we found hydrologic reconnection of tidal wetlands provided opportunities for invertebrate production and fish foraging within three years of restoration actions, indicating the effectiveness of restoration may occur on short time scales.</p>