Saving a Maine lake, river, the ocean from soil erosion, the wearing away of silt, particulates washed in to it from steep banks, lack of ground cover is serious business in a waterfront property watershed.
If you don't own Maine real estate or have seen erosion first hand, the subject may not be titillating, engaging.
If you are of Swedish, Finnish, Scandinavian decent I have found especially, you are well versed early on while knee high to a grasshopper so to speak.
About taking care of your land, woodlot, waterfront natural resource.
Maintain the property, passing it along to the next generation.
Your kids, grandchildren in better shape, or at the very least, as good as you received it.
The water should not race to a lake, dump in to a Maine river, leach in to the ocean.
Practices of good conservation to avoid soil erosion mean planting vegetative buffers along the shoreline of the Maine waterfront property.
And if there are steep grades, where trees have been removed, along a Maine lake camp road ditch, plunge pools may be good conservation practice to consider.
The rock lined "pool water container" is a series of holes dug, lined and to fill and spill to slow the pace of the rain, snow run off.
The racing water not contained, slowed carries with it dirt, soil, nutrients, leave debris straight in to the water.
And that explains why all the vegetation growing around the shoreline, and the accumulation of silt.
It is much easier to keep the soil in place up the hill with good conservation practices up front with education to the property owners about the ABC's of soil erosion.
Then try to return the silt, soil after it already dumps, gets placed in the precious Maine natural water resource.
This is Drews Lake, a place I enjoy because campers work together to protect it. Maine lake camp roads soil erosion a big part of the problem too.
Over used, improperly designed, under sized culverts or water flow restriction all add up to hurting the Maine lake further without a lot of funds to correct situations. Education about Maine's watershed is the best ammunition, defense and more pro-active rather than always taking a reactive stance. Where there are lots of erosion "fires" to put out but like an emergency room, and which ones most important with the never enough resources you have to tackle them.
And if all this talk about riparian buffers, conservation drainage diversion ditches with properly placed culverts, the right ground cover to keep water from racing in to a lake is ho hum, boring. Think about the fish, wildlife in that Maine lake, pond, river, ocean. Think for a minute you have gills, you gurgle when you talk.
And well, you drink and swim like a Maine fish.
The oxygen levels change in your "home" as the silt, nutrients dumped in to say a Maine lake begin to cause vegetation to grow. And add a slip or two of the dreaded milfoil plant that chokes the lake further and effectively kills it and the gorgeous, crystal clean happy place for fish, loons, ducks to live (and for us two legged animals to enjoy waterfront recreation on from swimming without swimmer's itch, boating to ice fishing) and a natural environmental nightmare happens.
The BP oil spill off the coast is an awful event. But just as staggering, serious is all the erosion, soil dump age and spoiling lake after river after ocean front in areas around states like Maine that are not spoiled, ruined or where it is just too lake.
Your Love Canal pollution situations get headlines when they are at monumental proportions. But when you add up the run of the mill, typical day in and day out soil erosion situation from improper wood cutting operations somewhere in the watershed draining in to our Maine waterfront, it is just if not more staggering. The effects just as devastating.
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