Improving Delta Lakes and Waterways

[DanP]

This is continued from the Flower Lake thread...

This may be a little long, so I apologize in advance.

In 1996 the Sierra Club sued the EPA stating they weren't doing their job, and they won. As a result the "303d" list was created. It is basically a list of "imperiled" lakes and waterways. Problems were identified on each water body and TMDL's (total maximum daily load) were established. Most problems are related to sedimentation, but some include nutrients and pathogens (such as fecal coliform). Here is the list for the MS Delta.

Abiaca Creek - Pathogens
Bear Creek Watershed - Organic Enrichment / Low DO and Nutrients
Bear Creek Watershed - Sediment / Siltation
Bee Lake - Organic Enrichement / Low DO, Nutrients, and Sediment
Big Sunflower River - Organic Enrichment / Low DO, Nutrients, and Sediment / Siltation
Big Sunflower River - Pathogens
Black Bayou - Organic Enrichment / Low DO and Nutrients
Black Creek - Pathogens
Coldwater River - Organic Enrichment / Low DO and Nutrients Coldwater River - Pathogens
Coldwater River - Sediment / Siltation
Cypress, Howlett, and Wade Bayous - Biological Impairment due to Toxicity and Unknown Pollutants
Deer Creek - Organic Enrichment / Low DO and Nutrients
Deer Creek - Pathogens
Deer Creek - Sediment / Siltation
Dump Lake - Organic Enrichment / Low DO, Nutrients, and Sediment
Enid Lake and Yocona River - Mercury
Fannegusha Creek - Pathogens
Hickahala, James Wolf, and Senatobia Creeks - Pathogens
Hickahala and Senatobia Creeks - Organic Enrichment / Low DO and Nutrients
Hurricane Creek - Organic Enrichment / Low DO and Nutrients
Hushpuckena River - Biological Impairment due to Toxicity
Lake Washington Organic Enrichment / Low DO, Nutrients, and Sediment
Little Tallahatchie River and Hotophia Creek - Pathogens
Moon Lake - Pathogens
Moon Lake - Sediment / Siltation
Moorhead Bayou - Organic Enrichment / Low DO and Nutrients
Old Little Talahatchie - Polychlorinated Biphenols (PCBs)
Perry Creek and Thompson Creek - Conductivity
Pinchback Lake - Pesticides
Red Banks Creek Canal - Toxicity
Steele Bayou - Sediment / Siltation
Senatobia Creek - pH
Tallahatchie River - Sediment / Siltation
Unnamed Tributary of Turkey Bayou - Toxicity
Wolf Lake - Nutrients and Sediment / Siltation
Yalobusha River - Pathogens
Yalobusha River - Sediment
Yazoo River - Pathogens
Yazoo River - Sediment
Yazoo River Basin - Pesticides

The EPA has to fix these problems. They have two options:

1) Regulatory, force farmers and landowners to fix problems on their property with their own money.

2) Provide funding through section 319 of the Clean Waters Act and give farmers/landowners a chance to be proactive and fix their problems with financial assisstance.

Option 2 is why large scale improvement projects have been implemented on Bee Lake, Steel Bayou (in progress), and other Delta waters.

Wolf Lake is in the planning phase. In order to recieve funding we must develop a plan, or proposal, and submit it to MS DEQ.
Step 1: Identify problems and get landowner consensus. All landowners (or a very high majority) must agree on what the problems are before any action is taken.
Step 2: Determine solutions. We will work with engineers, surveyors, MDWFP, USFWS, USACE, (the list is very long) to determine the best solution to each problem and ensure that no damages or increased risk occurs on any property.
Step 3: Implement the plans. Slow erosion in the adjacent fields by placing water control structures and rip-rap wiers, grassland buffer strips, CRP, WRP, many activities are undertaken to achieve the goal of improving water quality.

So, a weir at Wolf Lake is only a small part of the big picture. If landowners can agree that a weir is needed, then we will begin the process. But, stopping sediment is the # 1 priority.

There are a lot of rumours going around about the wier, some say its going to be 5' higher, some say its going in two months from now.
Bottom line is rumours make people wary or suspicous, which makes it difficult to reach landowner consensus, and if consensus is not reached then nothing will be done. No weir and the DEQ/EPA will resort to option 1.

Sorry for the long post, if you have any questions, concerns, or would like to become more involved in the Wolf Lake project you can e-mail me at dan@deltawildlife.org.

[DanP]

Here is a picture of a pipe/structure at work. Notice how clear the water is and this is drainage from a cultivated ag field. The ditch leading to the pipe has also been planted.



This is a structure that has been working since last summer. Last summer the bottom of the ditch was below the pipe.

[Po Monkey Lounger]

[dukmisr2005]

[JaMak84]

The federal government already spends millions of dollars every year on these types of projects. The programs to address these problems are already in place, but they're all volunteer. I don't think private landowners will accept big brother just coming in and taking their land from them. This theory of buying easements to protect water bodies is a great idea, but until it becomes more economically feasible for a farmer to sell the land rather than farm it, it won't happen.

[TODO]

[Super Black Eagle]

[Po Monkey Lounger]

I'm thinking of a plan that would not be necessarily voluntary in the truest sense. The landowner would be given the opportunity to "volunteer" for the program and negotiate a favorable easement payment. IF the landowner opts out, then the landowner is excluded from any future flood damage payments, etc. (emergency, property, crops, etc. ) from any state or federal government body (other than private insurance). And to the extent that the opt out landowner's activities near the waterbody result in pollutants and excessive silt entering the waterbody, from run off, etc., then heavy fines leveled.

I'm ready for our rivers and lakes to support abundant fish populations, and without the need for fish advisories.

[Wingman]

Landowners have a problem when they have to fork out money to prevent the erosion problem, but they don't mind at all the government spending 57 million to come on up the Tallahatchie and Coldwater to take the sediment out of the river that never should've run into it in the first place.

Everybody has to take responsibility. You disk up to the edge of the lake, leave your pipes open all winter on a plowed field and don't use buffer strips to slow the water, then you should have to help pay to fix the problem when area lakes and rivers are filling up with silt.

I noticed a watershed field next to Lake Washington this afternoon. I know there is a silt trap on the north end of Moon Lake and work has been done to Bee Lake. We need these projects before our favorite lakes are reduced to 2 foot deep grinnel holes.

Some of these erosion problems are simple to fix. I had a bad spot in my sunflower field where a water furrow ran through the turn row into the road ditch. 7 years ago the eye was about 3 feet deep and ran out into the field about 20 yards. By not disking the eye through the turnrow and allowing grass to grow up there, tossing in a backhoe bucket full of rip rap and only a little mowing, the abyss has turned into nothing more than a slight depression in the turn row. It's simple practices that take just a little effort that can fix most of the problems.

Tell Jabo and JimBob to move out a little when disking and plowing and leave a little buffer.

Drop your boards in the pipes this fall to hold the dirt in the field and slow down the runoff water.

Let that 15 acres of swamp grow back up in the original lake bottom. You aren't making any beans on it anyway because it floods 3 out of 5 years and drowns your crop.

It's conservation in small projects spread out over a large area that will benefit us all for many years to come.

[JaMak84]

[Po Monkey Lounger]

[JaMak84]

[Wingman]

[Wingman]