County: Multiple
Project Start Date: 10/01/2019
Project End Date: 10/31/2019
By Peter Ziegler, WWA Project Director
October had many wet days which have delayed a couple of our wetland restoration projects, mostly due to the fact that our wet weather has set excavating companies behind and site conditions aren’t real great for construction. WWA did, however, do a number of wild rice seedings. Pat Shay Lake in Forest County received its final seeding this year. The effort between WWA and local schools over the last three years appears to have been paying off. In an effort to re-establish a rice bed once lost, WWA formed a couple of partnerships with local schools, which provided education on wild rice and a helping hand in completing the actual seeding itself. This year the seeding was completed by Three Lakes – Global Science Class. The rice bed looked good this past year and started to really fill in the SE end of the lake. Hopefully it will continue to flourish on its own after this fall’s final seeding.
Entering the rice bed on Pat Shay Lake with students from Three Lakes Global Science, Project Director Peter Ziegler provides some education information to the group.
This means WWA is looking for new waters to do wild rice restoration on for next fall. If you have ideas please let us know by emailing wwainfo@centurytel.net. We also completed a seeding with some of our Wausau Chapter members on the Eau Claire River this fall. Our seedings targeted backwater areas which should help protect the rice during flow and high water events. Thanks to those who helped and hopefully we can set some more seedings up for next year.
A couple of WWA’s Wausau Chapter members seeding rice on some backwaters of the Eau Claire River in the Wausau area.
We also helped seed a large wetland complex in the Necedah area. This being very near the National Wildlife Refuge and other state land, it should certainly have a benefit to migratory birds by providing a valuable food resource during fall migration. It will also add to the overall habitat being provided by supplying a very desirable food source in a region with great waterfowl habitat.
Learn more about our Wild Rice program here.