|
|
|
Iowa
River Corridor
 The
Iowa River basin contains some of the most productive
agricultural lands in the nation. However, market economics
have periodically forced some land owners in this watershed
to expand agricultural production to flood-susceptible
habitats. Following years of intermittent but severe
flooding along portions of this river, federal authority
and funds were recently made available for the Service
to acquire a portion of the Iowa River corridor and
to help restore it back into a functioning floodplain
ecosystem that will support native plants and animals.
The Iowa
River Corridor Project was launched in 1995 by the Fish
and Wildlife Service and the Natural Resource Conservation
Service as a community-based effort of government, non-government,
and private partners to restore wetlands and the riparian
corridor along a nearly 50-mile reach of the Iowa River
between the towns of Tama and Marengo, Iowa.
 A
water quality monitoring effort lead by the Hygienic
Laboratory at the University of Iowa has been an
active component of the overall restoration project
since its inception. As a part of this water quality
monitoring effort, the La Crosse FRO has been cooperating
with the Hygienic Laboratory since 1997 to document
the extent to which brief periods of heavy rainfall
and snow melt runoff may increase the concentration
of several agricultural pollutants in small streams
here that flow into the Iowa River. Such contaminant-laden
runoff may threaten the long-term success of the Iowa
River Corridor Project and pose a localized health risk,
as well as contribute to distant environmental problems
of national concern such as the hypoxic zone in the
Gulf of Mexico.
The point
of contact for this project is:
Mark_Steingraeber@fws.gov
(608) 783-8436
|
|
|
|
|
|
Last updated:
July 10, 2008
