Photo By Melanie Peterson | A pelican flies over the ribbon cutting ceremony at Marsh Lake, near Appleton,...... read more read more
Speakers and guests gathered for a ribbon cutting ceremony at Marsh Lake, near Appleton, Minnesota, on a perfectly clear, summer day, July 14.
“Holding this dedication took five times, but I’m glad that journey was hard because nothing worth doing in life is easy, it takes a lot of hard work and effort,” said Dave Trauba, Regional Wildlife manager, Southern Region, with the Minnesota Department of Natural Resources, or MNDNR, at the ribbon cutting. “But I’m glad it took a long time to get to where we’re at today because it’s a much better project today than it would have been.”
Speakers included Trauba; Col. Karl Jansen, former St. Paul District commander; Sarah Strommen, MNDNR commissioner; Amber Doschadis, Upper Minnesota River Watershed District administrator; Jon Schneider, Conservation Programs manager, Minnesota Ducks Unlimited; and Win Mitchell, former Ducks Unlimited State chairman and local resident.
“We have a win here at Marsh Lake, but it was a tough win. In 2019, mother nature gave us a run for our money with high water flooding that challenged site conditions, but the whole team persevered,” Jansen said. “We win as a team, a combined team with our partnerships across this region. It’s our unified mission to restore, sustain and enhance the natural environment…and it’s the beauty of this project that will endure for generations and pay wonderful dividends for nature and our society.”
The Marsh Lake project involved habitat enhancement by improving conditions for waterfowl and fish in the area. The project included rerouting the Pomme de Terre River to its historic channel and constructing a drawdown structure and a fish passage at the Marsh Lake Dam. Less than 5%of the average cost for a habitat restoration project of this size, this project is expected to provide significant returns in environmental and habitat enhancement benefits. The total cost was $13.4 million.
Resilience is key to the success of this project.
“We’ve all learned a lot about resilience over the past couple years and really resilience is at the heart of what we do in our restoration work, and we can see the resilience in nature resources,” Strommen said. These efforts today will yield tremendous results preserving the river channels back to their historic conditions.”.
Marsh Lake lies within the Lac qui Parle Wildlife Management Area, managed by the MNDNR. In the fall, as many as 150,000 Canada geese use the management area at one time. Marsh Lake is also home to Minnesota’s largest breeding colony of American white pelicans and several species of fish. The variability associated with natural flooding and drying cycles will promote growth of emergent and submersed aquatic vegetation, increasing waterfowl habitat and reducing sediment resuspension.
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This story originally appeared in the Summer 2022 issue of Crosscurrents on pages 9 and 10 https://www.mvp.usace.army.mil/Media/Crosscurrents/
| Date Taken: | 07.14.2022 |
| Date Posted: | 10.07.2022 12:32 |
| Story ID: | 430967 |
| Location: | APPLETON, MINNESOTA, US |
| Web Views: | 42 |
| Downloads: | 0 |
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