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| Summer Fieldwork: Volunteers from Kiap-TU-Wish assisted Nate Anderson and his crew with seeding and mulching on three restoration projects this summer. The first was the newly restored stretch of Parker Creek downstream of the Pleasant Ave. bridge. Helping out were James Patterson, Chip Robingson, Dan Wilcox, and Tom Anderson. In late August we helped out with the newly restored Martin Easement on Plum Creek, immediately upstream of the Von Holtum easement. Volunteers assisting at the Martin easement were Jeff Dahl, Tom Anderson and Dave Gregg. In mid September volunteers were out again helping with the seeding mulching at the new Moody easement, over 4,000 feet of single bank restoration immediately downstream of the Main Street bridge on the Kinni as you enter River Falls from north. Those helping at the Moody easement were William Doherty, Tommy Doerenbush, and Tom Anderson. Josh Kucko (WDNR) and I installed “kissing gate” stiles on both the upstream and downstream sides of the bridge at the Gutting easement on the Trimbelle. Volunteers turned out in late July and early August to help Kasey Yallaly and her crew with their annual shocking surveys of both the Rush and Kinni Rivers. Helping out were Ben Toppel, Chip Robinson, Rainbow Barry, Tom Anderson, Mathew Chaplinsky, David Brockway and Brent OHara. On Sept. 8th, Loren Hasas, Jeff Himes, Chip Robinson, Ed Constantini, Bob Diesch, John Skelton, Dan Donahue, Sally Noll, Tom Anderson and Cary Wood turned out to help me with this years Pheasants Forever Youth Field Day held at the Game Unlimited hunt club in Hudson WI where we worked with over 50 youth having them each tie a fly, receive fly casting instruction and finally taking a stab at catching a fish at the small lake which is on the club grounds. I met up with Kasey two weeks ago where we visited sites on the Kinni in need of buckthorn, box elder and other invasive management. We identified the stretch of the Kinni between the Main ST. bridge and the Hwy 35 bridge as a site to use for the 4th grade class at Greenwood Elementary School in River Falls to use as they help us with a brush burn to serve as a service learning project for the 80 some students, teachers and parent chaperones. Cutting will begin there in the coming weeks to prepare enough cut brush for the kids to drag to a burn pile sometime in late November or early December Kasey and I also identified several sites where I plan to go in with volunteers in the coming weeks to do a foliar spray application of herbicide to kill off any buckthorn which has sprouted or was missed during recent restoration efforts on those sites. Recently I was out today on the South Fork of the Kinni along with Dave Gregg, Tom Anderson, Chip Robinson and John Skelton as we worked to remove a number of really large willow trees which stand way of some upcoming restoration work. Randy Arnold |
Habitat Update – Nov 2024
