A study conducted by BCWD in 2011 identified 71 homes out of 500 in the Croixwood neighborhood where residential raingardens like those built by Kathy Klonecki and Margaret and Robert Boettcher would most help to keep polluted runoff out of Long Lake.
Read MoreAll articles filed in Keeping water clean
Draining your pool without killing your lake
Don’t end up in the police blotter in your local paper. Don’t dump chlorinated water into the street or your local lake!
Read MoreGrassed Waterways
Per acre, lawns and suburban landscapes create as much polluted runoff as farmland, but cropland has a larger overall impact on our St. Croix, Mississippi and Minnesota River systems simply because so much more land is covered in crops than lawns.
Read MoreGoing Old School at Lake Phalen
By the 1990’s, the shoreline around Lake Phalen consisted of a mangy mix of riprap, weeds, eroding soil and remnant turf grass. In some locations, even the paved walking path was in danger of crumbling into to water.
Read MorePar for the Course?
This spring, the Oak Glen Golf Course in Stillwater is wrapping up a $300,000 stream improvement project that will restore natural habitat along 1300 feet of Brown’s Creek and convert two acres of land adjacent to the stream from turf grass into a buffer of native plants.
Read MoreBuried Treasure Optional
This year, the City of Bayport joined forces with the Middle St. Croix Watershed Management Organization to put an end to Perro Creek’s annual pollution parade.
Read MoreKeeping pharmaceuticals out of our water
So do you keep medicines in your cabinet forever and risk accidentally poisoning yourself with 15-year old pseudoephedrine, or dump them down the toilet and risk turning a boy fish into a girl?
Read MoreStriving Toward a Washington County Land Ethic
Aldo Leopold, a famous author (among conservationists at least) once wrote:
“The land ethic simply enlarges the boundaries of the community to include soils, waters, plants, and animals, or collectively: the land.”
Read MoreMild Winter – Frozen Septic?
Why in a mild winter like we have experienced would frozen septic systems be a problem? It’s due to the lack of snow and (occasional) cold temperatures we have been experiencing.
Read MoreReviewing the Past; Planning the Future
As we at the Washington Conservation District work with landowners on vegetation enhancements, we are often asked whether using native plants is better than introduced plants or cultivars.
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East Metro Water 