The St. Louis County Soil and Water Conservation District presented at Tuesday’s Boundary Waters Connect Group to a crowd of over 60.
The SWCD’s mission is to “engage people in the stewardship of our natural resources.”
The organization is not affiliated with the federal government, but rather a local government agency specific to St. Louis County.
As stated in the organization’s title, watershed management is the main concern.
“Watersheds are kinda like Russian nesting dolls,” said Jake Bendell, watershed conservationist. “Anything (in Ely) is gonna end up in the Shagawa Lake watershed. If we zoom out another level, we combine with the Fall Lake watershed. Zoom out another level, we’re at the Rainy Headwaters watershed, and this is the level that watershed management plans are written.”
Minnesota is uniquely situated at the head of a three-way divide: water in the north flows into the Canada and eventually Hudson Bay, northwest flows into the Great Lakes region, and central and southern Minnesota flows into the Mississippi and the Gulf.
The full plan can be located on the SWCD’s website under “Rainy Headwaters- Vermilion Watershed Comprehensive Watershed Management Plan.”
Bendell said, “Essentially we’re here to help landowners with natural resource management for conservation issues on the property.”
This includes, but is not limited to, individual landowners, landlords, and business owners looking to improve their storefronts, as long as there is a natural resource to justify the restoration located somewhere on the property.
One water management program available through the SWCD for folks with smaller or city-located lots is the Adopt-a-Storm-Drain Program.
“Storm drains don’t get treated, those eventually end up in our local waterways, so anything that’s on the street or goes down those drains ends up in our streams.”
This program was designed to incentivize residents to clean up around storm drains a few times a year, “whether that be salt, sediment, or debris.” Sign-up at https://mn.adopt-a-drain. org/.
Rachel Poppe, district forester, spoke about free services provided to landowners through the Sustainable Forests Incentive Act.
“We are actively looking to compensate landowners to keep (these forests) from being developed,” said Poppe. “The best way to get started on any of this, if you have forested land…is to schedule a site visit with a forester.
“If you are in St. Louis County, feel free to reach out to me. If you are in Lake or Cook County, I can get you the information for those foresters too.”
Landowners can qualify for cost-sharing plans with the county, which will cover 75% of the cost of a first time plan, and 50% of the cost for renewals. Cost-shares are also available for improving water quality through tree planting and pesky spruce budworm remediation.
Corey Denning, resource conservationist, spoke about the types of projects that qualify for county cost-sharing.
“How can landowners like yourself actually work with us? Free site visits to address a resource concern; whether that’s forest health, erosion, you want your shoreline improved, you have invasive species, or you want improved wildlife habitat.”
The agency will also provide guidance on how to maintain the project for up to 10 years.
“You must identify a resource concern; in our case, a lot of it pertains to water quality, but we also have some money to do smaller pollinator habitats.”
Feel free to reach out to Bendell at 218-780-0086, Poppe at 218-749-2000, or Denning at 218-288-6143.
“The biggest takeaway is that there are funding opportunities; site visits are free, if you have any questions about the land, what to do, how to manage it, check water quality, we’ll come out there for free and walk your property…listen to you guys and come up with a solution,” said Denning.
“We’re here to help! We’re not regulatory, we can’t tell you that you have to change something if you don’t want to,” said Bendell.
