Tuesday, April 5, 2016
David Flick, Principal and Founder of Terra Technologies, is proud to announce that the Kansas City District of the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers has approved the Kansas River and Missouri River Wetland and Stream Umbrella Mitigation Bank along with its first mitigation site. The first umbrella mitigation bank in Kansas, the Kansas River and Missouri River Wetland and Stream Umbrella Mitigation Bank will function as a regional mitigation program across the Lower Kansas River and Lower Missouri River watersheds that comprise much of northeastern Kansas, including most of Johnson County. As a result, it will likely be the primary method used to compensate for impacts to existing wetlands and streams for most of the Kansas side of the Kansas City metropolitan area.
An umbrella mitigation bank operates as an ongoing mitigation program across an entire watershed by providing a policy framework that guides the establishment of an initial on-the-ground mitigation site as well as numerous future mitigation locations. The umbrella mitigation bank document includes an analysis of historical and current water quality issues within the watershed that identifies immediate and long-term habitat and water quality needs and then determines which locations should receive the highest priority for the establishment of future mitigation sites. The umbrella mitigation bank document also sets policy guidelines about the creation and operation of the mitigation sites, including such factors as performance standards, financial assurances, credit calculations methods, and long-term management.
Located in the top priority watershed for restoration in Kansas, the 68-acre Little Stranger Creek mitigation site is the initial project site of the Kansas River and Missouri River Wetland and Stream Umbrella Mitigation Bank.
The immediate floodplain of Little Stranger Creek will be returned from row crop agriculture to its historical state of riparian buffer and a mixture of forested, scrub-shrub, marsh, and wet prairie wetlands. Most of the site’s 21 acres of wetlands will be located in the flat fields adjacent to Little Stranger Creek which have been row crop fields for decades. However, several small wetlands are planned across the site in minor drainages to establish a variety of wetland habitats across the parcel. More than 19 acres of prairie will be established next to the site’s wetlands, buffering the wetlands from the adjacent agriculture and low density residential land uses.
An eroding portion of Little Stranger Creek will be stabilized using a longitudinal peaked stone toe. Also, past agricultural alterations to the site’s smaller streams will be reversed. Specifically, the original path of a channelized intermittent stream will be restored and will flow through a pond previously built in its path that will be drained. This will allow the stream to have frequent and easy access to a sizable adjacent wetland which will provide significant water quality benefits. Two ephemeral streams that were partially or entirely removed by agriculture will also be re-established. Wide riparian buffers will be planted with diverse native trees, shrubs, grasses, and forbs to replace the existing degraded riparian corridors.
This site’s combination of wetlands, forested areas, streams, and prairies will provide a valuable mixture of ecosystems for numerous species that use both wet and dry habitats for different parts of their life cycles, particularly amphibians and water birds. In addition, this mitigation site surrounds an adjacent 24.5-acre approved mitigation site that itself includes riparian buffer widening and channel improvements along more than 2,000 linear feet of Little Stranger Creek and the restoration of 1,400 linear feet of a floodplain ephemeral stream that had been eradicated by decades of agricultural disturbance. Together, these mitigation sites will function as a single unit to improve the water quality and wildlife habitat along Little Stranger Creek.
For more information about mitigation services, contact your local office of Terra Technologies.
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