Provides grants to Soil and Water Conservation Districts that focuses on increasing capacity to address four resource concern areas?Soil Erosion, Riparian Zone Management, Water Storage and Treatment, and Excess Nutrients.
Provides grants to Soil and Water Conservation Districts that focuses on increasing capacity to address four resource concern areas?Soil Erosion, Riparian Zone Management, Water Storage and Treatment, and Excess Nutrients.
Provides grants to Soil and Water Conservation Districts that focuses on increasing capacity to address four resource concern areas?Soil Erosion, Riparian Zone Management, Water Storage and Treatment, and Excess Nutrients.
This project targets nutrient reductions within the Mayhew and Big Elk Lake watersheds. The Benton Soil and Water Conservation District will work with farmers in implementing a variety of conservation practices including, but not limited to cropland erosion control projects, riparian pasture management, and nutrient management and feedlot pollution control systems. These strategies were identified through Total Daily Maximum Load Studies.
Little Rock Lake experiences severe algae blooms due to excess phosphorus and these blooms are the worst known regionally. The goal of this project is to reduce algae blooms, improve water clarity, and avoid risk of drinking water contamination. The project will result in installing one farmer nutrient management project , four cover crops, two lakeshore buffer strips, six septic systems that also demonstrated an imminent threat to public health, six erosion control projects , one wetland restored, and one feedlot runoff control system.
A completed Total Maximum Daily Load (TMDL) study has identified mid to late summer phosphorus loading as a significant stressor to lakes and streams within the Big Elk Lake watershed. While this comprehensive study serves its role as the unifying document that identifies pollutants and sources, further work is required in order to develop site-specific Best Management Practices, design these practices, and oversee their implementation in order to reach clean water goals.
The Benton County Water Plan advisory committee has the goal of protecting groundwater resources in Benton County. One of the methods identified is to seal unused wells. In 2013, Benton Soil and Water Conservation District completed an aggressive campaign to identify unused wells. We used several sources to locate potential wells, completed site visits for many wells and collected site information to assisting in prioritizing limited cost share resources.
The Crow Wing Soil and Water Conservation District (SWCD) proposes to partner with citizen groups and nonprofit groups to complete projects that will reduce polluted runoff and keep water on the land in Crow Wing County's (CWC) 125 minor watersheds. To do this, the SWCD will implement a mini grant program and provide competitive grant funds to an anticipated 12 groups. Citizens groups will use their innovation and creativity to apply for project funds through the SWCD.
The project will include lake monitoring on seventeen lakes found in the Mississippi River - Brainerd watershed in East Central Crow Wing County (CWC). The project will be conducted in an effort to gain data on these data-deficient lakes. One of the goals of the CWC Local Comprehensive Water Plan (CWP) is to establish a countywide Comprehensive Monitoring Plan (CMP). Surface water assessment monitoring will enable state 303(d) and 305(b) assessments and provide a better understanding of these lakes.
This project will conduct a 2017 revision of the South Fork Crow River, North Fork Crow River and Sauk River Watershed Hydrological Simulation Program FORTRAN (HSPF) models and review of the Pine River Watershed HSPF model.
The Minnesota DNR and the Minnesota Forest Resources Council work with forest landowners, managers and loggers to implement a set of voluntary sustainable forest management guidelines that include water quality best management practices (BMPs) to ensure sustainable habitat, clean water, and productive forest soils, all contributing to healthy watersheds. This project will monitor the implementation of these forest management guidelines and BMPs on forested watersheds in MN.
Minnesota’s use of groundwater has increased over the last two decades. An increasing reliance on groundwater may not be a sustainable path for continued economic growth and development. The DNR is establishing three pilot groundwater management areas (GWMA) to help improve groundwater appropriation decisions and help groundwater users better understand and plan for future groundwater needs associated with economic development.
Funding supports an Irrigation Specialist to develop guidance and provide education on irrigation and nitrogenbest management practices (BMPs). In this position, Dr. Vasu Sharma provides direct support to irrigators onissues of irrigation scheduling and soil water monitoring. She is collaborating on the development of new irrigationscheduling tools that help irrigators manage water and nitrogen resources more precisely. These tools help reducenitrogen leaching losses in irrigated cropping systems.
This project will address Minnesota Pollution Control Agency (MPCA), United States Environment Protection Agency (EPA), and public comments on draft Total Maximum Daily Load (TMDL) studies and Watershed Restoration and Protection Strategy (WRAPS) reports, preliminary draft TMDL studies, and public noticed TMDL studies and WRAPS reports for the Lower Red River Watershed and the Lake of the Woods Watershed and produce final versions of the TMDL studies and WRAPS reports for each watershed.
This grant will fund the creation of a new Coordinator position with a primary focus on the Mille Lacs Lake subwatershed. Although not currently impaired, the Lake faces increasing development and land use pressure. Implementation of protection strategies is essential to the Lake's long-term health but current staffing does not allow sufficient time to be spent on project development and outreach to identify interested landowners.
Several important milestones will be completed during this phase of the Mississippi River (Headwaters) Watershed Restoration and Protection Strategy (WRAPS) project. These milestones will include the completion of the Stressor ID & Watershed Monitoring and Assessment Reports, the completion of the Zonation Modeling watershed priority planning process (through the continuation of the Civic Engagement project component), and the development of the overall WRAPS report.
Several important milestones will be completed during this Phase (Phase II) of the Mississippi River (Headwaters) Watershed Restoration and Protection Strategy (WRAPS) project. These milestones will include the completion of the Stressor ID & Watershed Monitoring and Assessment Reports, the completion of the Zonation Modeling watershed priority planning process (through the continuation of the Civic Engagement project component), and the development of the overall WRAPS report.
This project will determine the condition of the water bodies in the Otter Tail River watershed, initiate public participation in the Watershed Restoration and Protection Strategy (WRAPS) development process, begin identification of potential stressors and priority management areas within the watershed, and begin development of initial drafts of the Total Maximum Daily Load (TMDL) study and WRAPS report.
The goal of this project is to complete the construction, calibration, and validation of a Hydrological Simulation Program FORTRAN (HSPF) watershed model for the Otter Tail River watershed. The contractor will produce an HSPF model that can readily be used to provide information to support conventional parameter Total Maximum Daily Load (TMDL) Studies. The model will generate predicted output for hydrology, sediment, nutrients, and dissolved oxygen that is consistent with observed data.
This project is a continuation of a Total Maximum Daily Load (TMDL) study that addresses lake eutrophication (phosphorus) in two lakes that are on the 2014 United States Environmental Protection Agency 303(d) list of impaired waters, located in the Pine River Watershed. The contractor will be responding to public comment on the Pine River TMDL.
The purpose of this project is to address Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) comments on the pre-public notice draft Total Maximum Daily Load (TMDL) report that were received by Minnesota Pollution Control Agency (MPCA) in January 2016.
The goal of this project is to extend, calibrate, and validate the existing Hydrological Simulation Program – FORTRAN (HSPF) watershed models in the Red Lake River, Thief River, Clearwater River and Red Lake watersheds.
This is the second phase of the Roseau River Watershed Restoration and Protection Strategy (WRAPS) project, which includes: developing the Total Maximum Daily Load (TMDL) study, pollutant load allocations, watershed restoration and protection strategies, and conducting civic engagement.
Approximately 70 percent of all Minnesotans rely on groundwater as their primary source of drinking water. Wells used for drinking water must be properly sealed when removed from service to protect both public health and Minnesota’s invaluable groundwater resources. The Minnesota Department of Health with the assistance of the Board of Water and Soil Resources protects both public health and groundwater by assuring the proper sealing of unused wells.” Clean Water funds are being provided to home owners as a 50% cost-share assistance for sealing unused private drinking water wells.
The goal of this project is to gather and collect necessary watershed data for the development of a Watershed Restoration and Protection Strategy (WRAPS) for the Upper/Lower Red Lakes Watershed that includes impairments, their causes, and plans for restoration. Implementation of the WRAPS will maintain or improve water quality for the watershed.
The primary goal of this project is to examine the calibration and validation of recently extended Hydrological Simulation Program – FORTRAN (HSPF) watershed models for the Mississippi River-Headwaters, Mississippi River-Grand Rapids, Mississippi River-Brainerd, Mississippi River-Sartell, Mississippi River-St. Cloud, Leech Lake, Pine River, Crow Wing River, Long Prairie River, and Redeye River watersheds and revise the calibration.
This is a joint project between the United States Geological Survey (USGS), Minnesota Pollution Control Agency (MPCA), North Dakota, and Manitoba. The project is a basin-wide, up-to-date water quality trend analysis using the "QWTrend" program for approximately 40 bi-national river sites to review nutrients, total suspended solids, total dissolved solids, sulfate and chloride from 1980 - 2015.
Trained staff will help assure the water chemistry data that is collected is of good quality. After the 1 day training events participants will be able to calibrate sonde water quality monitoring sensors in a lab or field setting, deploy the calibrated sonde to collect water chemistry, store sondes properly during non-field season and perform preventative maintenance or simple troubleshooting actions with the help of tech support. This will be satisfied by two different training events held in 2017.
