Great Lakes Aquatic Habitat News
The Newsletter of the Great Lakes
Aquatic Habitat Network and Fund
The Great Lakes Aquatic Habitat News is the newsletter of the Great Lakes Aquatic Habitat Network and Fund, published five times per year. The News is intended to provide a forum for the free exchange of ideas among citizens and organizations working to protect aquatic habitats in the Great Lakes Basin.
Volume 15, Number 4 • Winter 2007
Lake Superior
Basin Update
St.Mary’s River Improved by Model Stormwater Wetland
By Carol Martin, Lake Superior Conservancy and Watershed Council
Sault Ste.Marie’swaterfront will soon be
home to a demonstration pond and
wetland with secondary benefit to the St.
Mary’s River. Clergue Park is the location
of a development that will include a
paving-stone walkway along the
shoreline, a separated bike path, and two
viewing platforms, as well as an entrance
plaza along Russ Ramsey Way. The
centerpiece of this development is a created wetland that serve as
a demonstration, says city planner Steve Turco.
The demonstration wetland area is one technique for managing
stormwater and will provide city engineering and planning staff
with information on which to base stormwater management
standards for new subdivision developments.
The City Council plans to commission a stormwater management
study in 2008. City Director of Engineering Don Elliot is looking for
funding for the study, expected to cost about $200,000. Among
other things, the study will investigate the feasibility of
incorporating a combination of wet ponds and dry ponds to
achieve standard of removing 70% of particulate matter before
the stormwater hits the river.
In his report to Council Elliot said,“It is becoming evident that the
city needs to formalize a plan for addressing storm water quality
as well as quantity. One of our own interpretations of the early
results of the St. Mary’s River bacteriological sampling program
this summer appears to indicate that the stormwater outfalls are
a significant source of bacteria in the river, as elevated bacteria
counts are experienced near the outfalls, especially after rain
events.”
The demonstration wetland part of the Clergue Park development
was funded by a grant from Brookfield Power, and its installation
is being overseen by projectmanager Doug Leask ofWm. R.Walker
Engineering Inc. Leask says the wetland will include plantings of
both submergent and emergent species such as cattails that
naturally remove toxins and metals through their metabolism.
Water in thewetland,whichwill be located behind the boat slip on
St. Mary’s River, will flow through these plantings directly into St.
Mary’s River. The physical design of the area will promote a
self-sustaining, fully functioning wetland.
Jennifer Hallett, a fish habitat biologist with Fisheries and Oceans
Canada, said the process will take some time and a lot of work but
designers of the wetland hope to establish plants such as cattails,
bulrushes and lily pads.The plants and wildlife are interdependent
and promote each other’s establishment, said Hallett, who is
hopeful that the people managing the wetland will be able to
nurture it to self-sustenance.
Part of the demonstration wetland will be established over a
large stormwater sewer outflow pipe that Hallett said is being
re-engineered so that significant and sudden increases in water
volume through the pipe will not threaten the wetland. She also
says that the plantings above the pipe should help to clean some
of the water that would have flowed directly into the river around
the pipe.
“Some municipalities and mines are using wetlands as a final
polishing pond to treat effluent,” said Hallett. “The mix of all the
plants and wildlife work together to clean the water of a variety of
contaminates. Some contaminates are food for some plants while
other plants sequester contaminates in their tissues or put it into
the soil.”
The demonstration wetland shaping up in Clergue Park and
behind the boat slip on St.Marys River will be closelymonitored as
it develops andmany valuable lessons about howbest to establish
a working wetland will be learned. Lake Superior Conservancy and
Watershed Council, Clean North, Sault Field Naturalists and the
local Conservation Authority are among the groups maintaining
an interest in how the demonstration wetland is managed and
how well it performs.
Contact Carol Martin, Lake Superior Conservancy
and Watershed Council for more info:
(705) 946-0044 or info.lscwc@ontera.net
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