P2 watershed meeting tonight

Just found out about it and thought I’d post. Willy’s Hidden Harbor at 7.

http://stateoftheriver.com/upcoming-events/

State of the river report.

The meeting was not a total sleeper. They did have some alarming facts…. There really was no fishing information but they did reconize that studies to the game fish of P2 are needed. There is some good info about the silt issues. One statement that they made was intresting…… Within this decade we could see the upstream 3rd of Pepin dissapear. They are working on ideas to eliminate silt build up on P2 and I can olny think this will increase the amount Pepin will see??? Dont know but do know most of that silt going down is coming through LD2

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Dont know but do know most of that silt going down is coming through LD2

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and P3
and upper P4

I’m afraid to say it, but stopping siltation is like stopping Asian Carp…except silt is here and the carp are not.

I know it can be slowed by shore practices, but really, how can a person stop silt from coming down a river with mud banks? RipRap the whole thing?

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Within this decade we could see the upstream 3rd of Pepin dissapear

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I believe you meant that within this “century” we could see a large amount of Pepin filled in. If it was going to happen this decade, that would occur within the next 7 years. Also, in there little findings PDF they mentioned the same only the time frame was a century. Still no good…

-Drew

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Dont know but do know most of that silt going down is coming through LD2

---

and P3
and upper P4

I’m afraid to say it, but stopping siltation is like stopping Asian Carp…except silt is here and the carp are not.

I know it can be slowed by shore practices, but really, how can a person stop silt from coming down a river with mud banks? RipRap the whole thing?

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Its easy, but requires confronting farming practices. Probably legislating, and regulating even more.

Depends what you care about.

It all comes down to the Minnesota River and agricultural tiling. Many fields now drain rapidly into the Minnesota after a good rain, and all this silt ends up in the sippi. This is by far and away the No. 1 cause of siltation. Obviously there is always silt in any river, but this is a manmade circumstance that is putting way more silt into the upper miss than would ever be there naturally. The meeting was pretty good, especially the part where they talked about baby eagles

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Within this decade we could see the upstream 3rd of Pepin dissapear

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I believe you meant that within this “century” we could see a large amount of Pepin filled in. If it was going to happen this decade, that would occur within the next 7 years. Also, in there little findings PDF they mentioned the same only the time frame was a century. Still no good…

-Drew

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Yes sir, within the century is what I wanted to type

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Dont know but do know most of that silt going down is coming through LD2

---

and P3
and upper P4

I’m afraid to say it, but stopping siltation is like stopping Asian Carp…except silt is here and the carp are not.

I know it can be slowed by shore practices, but really, how can a person stop silt from coming down a river with mud banks? RipRap the whole thing?

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I hear you here Brian. Some methods seem silly but my concern for you folks downriver are what will happen when these methods take place on P2. Like said the main source is the MN river. No doubt and once they start to work here to allow this silt too move along there will be one mess heading your way before things even start to clean up around here. Maybe more of an FYI to people south. I do want to see and effort to try and do something but when they flush the toilet up here today….. It turns to your issue tomorrow???

Quote:

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Quote:

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Dont know but do know most of that silt going down is coming through LD2

---

and P3

and upper P4

I’m afraid to say it, but stopping siltation is like stopping Asian Carp…except silt is here and the carp are not.

I know it can be slowed by shore practices, but really, how can a person stop silt from coming down a river with mud banks? RipRap the whole thing?

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Just the opposite Brian. Get rid of the rip rap and channelization of the river. All the rip rap and channel does is funnel the silt farther down river faster so it deposits it somewhere else. Pool 2 does not generate the silt so there is nothing that can be done on this pool to fix it.

So you’re saying Mike, the exposed dirt banks of the MN river would have less silt taken from them exposed?

It seems like the contours of that river are always changing, banks get undercut, then fall in. I’m not even considering the farmland run off. Just the river banks.

I mean the river isn’t channelized by Redwood Falls and it looks just as muddy there.

I’m not even an armchair engineer.

Yep. Let it go back to its natural state and the river will take care of itself. Rip rap more banks and its like forcing water threw a funnel. It will speed up and just cause more problems down river.

But what do I know Brian. Im jut a plumber.

Rip rap will save the bank that is rip rapped. Maybe they should just incase them all in concrete.

They did say at the meeting that both Minn and Miss Rivers have increased overall flow due to manmade factors, and that the increased flow also increases siltation. A certain level of siltation is natural in any river. The big point is that the level of silt deposited in Lake Pepin every year is 10 times what it should be.

Crawdaddy, did they have any solutions?

What about the baby eagles?

They pretty much said that there are options to help with the silt in the MN but to put a bullet proof plan in place would be a political nightmare. What is good for one is not so good for the other….

I dont need to hear there “baby eagle” presentation again… Little mushy for me to be honest. One boat ride in April/May and anyone can get a good idea on the health of our eagle situation. They did say they found one nest site north of Coon rapids that showed the highest DDT levels that they have ever seen! All other sites where at healthy levels but that one.

It was asked by an attendee if agricultural runoff was accounted for in the clean water act. In fact it is not, and currently there is no regulation on drainage of agricultural land, so farmers can tile and drain their land however they see fit. Retention ponds, sloughs, marshes, etc. are generally considered to help with this issue, so hopefully more landowners let their fields drain first into one of these and then more slowly over time into the Minnesota River. I am definitely not a big supporter of government regulation, but something needs to be done to reduce the silt-load of the MN.

The eagles are really doing good on the National Park portion of the upper Miss. The nests are averaging 2 eaglets each mating season, while the nationwide average is 1. In addition to the already mentioned DDT in one baby eagle, there was a significant amount of lead found in the blood of a baby eagle nested near pigs eye lake. Every late spring/summer the National Park Service/Dept. of the Interior hire a professional tree climber to go up to the eagle nest and bring the baby eagle down for a quick check up/blood sample. How they do this without mama eagle clawing someone’s eyes out they didn’t say….

DDT? Really?

I thought it was banned in the late ’50’s or ’60’s when they found it made the birds egg shells thinner (among other things)

I’m surprised it’s around in any reportable numbers.

As far as the run off, as long as WE keep tiling and making larger parking lots/roads ect, the “flash flooding” will continue to get worse.

I think we are all to blame for run off. Its not just farmer fields that are drained. Show me a road in mn that does not have a ditch next to it. Guess where those ditches go. I would bet if it is with in 50 to 100 miles of a river thats where it is heading.

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I think we are all to blame for run off. Its not just farmer fields that are drained. Show me a road in mn that does not have a ditch next to it. Guess where those ditches go. I would bet if it is with in 50 to 100 miles of a river thats where it is heading.

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Its a good thing that they don’t monitor how many socks, tennis balls or sandals float bye