The "Sandusky Bay Initiative" and Restoration of Wetlands in Peril

A wetland "restorability" map that highlights specific areas along the southwest shoreline of Lake Erie that are candidates for restoration of wetland habitats. The area circled in black is all of Sandusky Bay.
The area circled in red is our marsh -- a lot of yellows, oranges, and reds means great potential.

Roy and I were invited to be part of a select 50 or-so individuals who attended a press conference put on by the Ohio EPA this morning at Cedar Point. Most of the seats were filled with higher-ups from various agencies and/or politicians (including Sen. Randy Gardner (R), who spoke of the tremendous importance of the Lake and lakeshore, locally, nationally, and even globally).

The hoopla involved an oversized check (with seven digits after the $) presented to the City of Sandusky. These funds will help in the “creation” of up to four coastal marsh environments. But more importantly, the “Sandusky Bay Initiative” marks the official commencement of what will be a multi-agency/stakeholder effort to improve the condition of the waters surrounding our marsh. 

Whether this specific program impacts Standing Rush directly or not remains to be seen, but it is yet another example of the attention our region is rightfully receiving. Lake Erie truly is our greatest natural resource. And the habitats that help protect its waters most – wetlands – are in significant peril.

According to the U.S. Fish & Wildlife Service, the United States' Lower 48 has lost over 50-percent of its wetland acreage since the country was first colonized. Approximately one-third of these total losses can be attributed to just seven states in the Midwest farm belt – including Ohio. According to the U.S. Geological Survey, at 90-percent wetland loss, Ohio ranks second only to California (at 91-percent) in the entire nation for losses in wetland habitat.

Prior to European settlement, the wetlands associated with Lake Erie’s southwest shoreline (collectively referred to as The Great Black Swamp) encompassed more than 1,500 square miles – an area larger than the Florida Everglades. As of the late 1980s, less than 60 square miles or approximately 37,000 acres remained. That represents a staggering 96% loss.

Current estimates suggest that the remaining acreage of coastal wetlands in the region now stands at somewhere between 20,000 and 30,000 acres. The broad range in this estimate relates back to how a coastal wetland is defined. But independent of the figure accepted, it is impossible to deny that the number of total acres continues to decline. And it is also impossible to deny that at somewhere around 2-percent of all that remains, Standing Rush’s holdings are critically important.

More Really Exciting News

Priority One on the West Marsh

Over the last two weeks we have been engaged in some really intriguing conversations relating to major restoration priorities on the West Marsh. This past spring, we were asked to submit project proposals that could augment the newly established Sandusky Bay Initiative -- a multi-agency collaboration intended to focus resources on improved water quality on Sandusky Bay and Lake Erie.

We have now received confirmation that we have been selected as a project site to receive funding through the Great Lakes Restoration Initiative (GLRI) to informally kick-start these planning efforts with on-the-ground improvement projects. This work is being spearheaded by the ODNR's Office of Coastal Management Program, but other key players include the Division of Wildlife, and the Erie County Conservation District.

Recent meetings have confirmed that our primary focus will be the replacement of our aging sluiceway -- the 65' concrete structure that serves as the direct conduit between our West Marsh and Sandusky Bay. At more than 50 years old, the existing infrastructure has served the site well. But as you can see from the photo at left, time hasn't been gentle on this important site of water connectivity.

Final designs for the new structure will be completed over this fall/winter. The way it is sounding, we may be able to more than double the width (to 6') and increase the free exchange of water by 400%+. This will have far-reaching positive impact not only on water movement between the marsh and bay, but also on the contents of the water -- maybe most notably the nutrients and fish.

We are excited to share the designs as they unfold. Likely features include sheet-pile side walls (to replace cracked and bowing concrete), aluminum stop logs (to replace custom-cut treated lumber), multiple screw gates (to vastly improve management capabilities), and fabricated "carp grates" (built to allow desirable fish through while preventing too many breeding carp from entering the system).

We are extremely grateful for our local partners

While we hope to have the new sluiceway completed by this time next year, we are very much encouraged by our partners' collective interest in discussing and exploring subsequent projects that could serve as future improvement efforts under the project umbrella. This is a huge opportunity for improvement -- not only for the site, but for the surrounding landscape. We are thrilled to be involved!

The Great Lakes Restoration Initiative (GLRI)

March on Sandusky Bay -- a view of Standing Rush's west shoreline from a couple hundred yards off-shore.

The Great Lakes Restoration Initiative (GLRI) is the most comprehensive federal program in our nation's (and our region's) history that is explicitly structured to address the most pressing environmental issues impacting Lake Erie and the broader Great Lakes. Its funding -- in fact, its very existence -- is in extreme peril based on the most recent federal budget proposed in Washington.

However, care should be taken to make this a party-biased issue. While it's true that funding was initiated early in President Obama's administration, much of the foundation was set through George W. Bush's presidency.

This topic has been and will be in the local and national news a lot lately. And well it should be. From an article just yesterday in The Blade (Toledo's primary newspaper) . . . "the Great Lakes Restoration Initiative has funded work to restore natural habitats, combat invasive species, and clean up pollution. It’s also done work to reduce the nutrient load that leads to harmful algal blooms like the one that fouled Toledo’s drinking water in 2014. The program funds work across the Great Lakes region, which has included dozens of projects in northwest Ohio."

The rest of the article can be seen here. Trust that there will be plenty more commentary on this topic as the story continues to unfold.

December 2020: Wrapping Up a Year Like No Other

December is customarily a whirlwind -- not just at the marsh but everywhere else. 2020 was no exception. Despite 31 days, it all seems to get condensed down to about two weeks professionally (if you're lucky), so we did well to complete two finite goals involving outside contractors (in addition to wrapping up the duck season, winterizing the shop and the bunkhouse, and tying up end-of-year accounting).

Project #1 took a fair amount of planning and prep because it took place in the county right-of-way along our NE property line. We needed the blessing of the USACE (which we got with our permit issued in November) and the County Engineer (a $10 driveway permit), but essentially all we were doing was rebuilding a pull-off that existed until a previous owner thought it made sense to remove it -- to try to eliminate trespassing by fishermen. The work was completed essentially in one (LONG) day.

Nothing like squeezing one last project in before the end of the calendar year. Our restored driveway access on the NE corner of the property.

The restored driveway access in process.

Guardrail installation makes for a safe, secure entrance.

Project #2 was orchestrated by ODNR's Office of Coastal Management, or technically a sub contracted by one of Coastal's engineering firms working to advance the Sandusky Bay Initiative. Theoretically, the job was going to involve the drilling of one bore hole, 40-50' into the ground (with the idea of the results confirming constructability for potential improvement projects down the road). That ended up being the easy part. The challenge was keeping the drill rig from falling into the marsh and then getting it out of the mud and back on the road. That ended up taking the better part of a second day, but we (and by "we" I mean Roy) got it done!

The "easy" part of the drilling job (the actual drilling).

The "hard" part -- the caravan of vehicles it took to extract the drill rig.
Ultimately, no harm done.

Last "tailgate portrait" of 2020 -- final duck hunt of the season.

Several dozen trumpeter swans lined the highway across from the bunkhouse as I headed back following my last visit to the marsh for 2020. Not a bad way to be ushered home.

"I had no idea . . ."

While the audio is hard to pick up, Roy is pointing out how the West Marsh spillway is conveying water that has filtered through literally hundreds of acres of our marsh before it is released (in a "cleaner" state) into Sandusky Bay; 

video taken following a series of heavy rains -- July, 2015

A few nights back, I was talking with my wife about reactions to my posts to this journal. I remain somewhat surprised that most aren't using the built-in comment features, but I am equally interested at the growing feedback I receive via email and even in person, as the number of readers continues to grow. As the audience broadens, backgrounds become more varied. Yet the most common sentiment seems to be, "I had no idea . . ."

How that sentence is finished depends on the individual (and usually the specifics of what was read), but I was struck when my wife said virtually the same thing. "Most people have no idea why all this is so important."

"All this" is a big topic. So I guess I'll start with why I see wetland conservation and restoration as so vital to each and every one of us. More specifically, I'd like to focus on one particular reason that is justifiably getting a lot of area press -- particularly since late summer, three years back.

The City of Toledo’s multi-day drinking water ban of August 2014 put wetlands and their ties to Lake Erie water quality very much at the forefront of local, regional, and even national media coverage. Often referred to as “nature’s kidneys,” coastal marshes are the last line of defense to convert excess nutrients (most notably phosphorus) to plant growth before entering a lake like Erie – where the overly abundant nutrients can nourish nuisance algal blooms. Wetland environments also take up a wide array of other chemicals and compounds – think natural and manufactured fertilizers, herbicides, pesticides, oils & greases, road salts, and even pharmaceuticals – to name a few. Wetlands have an innate ability to lock these "nasties" and more into growth forms (i.e., plants) that often do an amazing job of breaking them down into much less hostile elements.

This takes a diversity of organisms, time, and space. So when 300,000+ acres of coastal marsh on the Western Basin of Lake Erie (pre-European settlement) dwindles to less than 30,000 acres (present day), why is what remains so important? I'd like to share a few excerpts from columnist Jack Lessenberry's May 5, 2017 article from The Blade to help make the connection between preservation, restoration, and clean drinking water:

Few people know Lake Erie as well as Jeffrey Reutter, the recently retired director of the Ohio Sea Grant and Stone Laboratory on the lake . . . 

A few weeks ago, at a “Farmers Together” forum on saving Lake Erie, I asked him what would happen if President Trump’s budget ending all funds for the Great Lakes Restoration Initiative and slashing funds for the EPA becomes reality. 

The scientist, who is anything but an alarmist, responded instantly. “We can no longer count on Lake Erie producing safe drinking water for the 11 million people it now serves.”

To me, these few sentences sum up what has (rightfully) become a media blitz on the topic of safe and reliable drinking water. The need is obviously real, and the impact is broad. At the risk of being perceived as an extremist or alarmist myself: while there are many crucially important causes out there, I believe wetlands are at the heart of something vital to our very existence.

I'll write more on wetland's many values and functions in the days and weeks to come.