Grant will fund habitat projects on Lower Wisconsin State Riverway properties
MADISON – November 27, 2015 – (RealEstateRama) — The state will conduct projects to restore and manage barrens communities and prairie remnants for the benefit of wildlife species in the Lower Wisconsin State Riverway thanks to a $35,676 grant from the Natural Resources Foundation of Wisconsin.
Barrens communities are present on the broad sandy river terraces of the Lower Wisconsin River and include pine barrens, oak barrens and sand barrens. Habitat work on these projects includes mechanical and chemical treatment of invasive trees, brush and herbaceous plants, constructing firebreaks and conducting prescribed burns.
Project locations in Richland, Grant and Iowa counties are Mazomanie barrens, Mazomanie Unit; Curson Slough, Lone Rock Unit; WP&L, Avoca Unit; Pine Road/Paffenrath, Muscoda Unit; Millville oak barrens, Millville Unit; and Baxter prairie remnants, Millville Unit.
The grant comes from the Natural Resources Foundation’s Lower Wisconsin State Riverway Fund, which was created by the late Paul Brandt of Boscobel, a Department of Natural Resources wildlife manager for 33 years. Before he died, Brandt created this named endowment fund through the Wisconsin Conservation Endowment to permanently support the Wisconsin Department of Natural Resources’ wildlife habitat restoration and management activities along the Lower Wisconsin Riverway.
“It was Paul’s hope that others who use the Riverway and who care deeply about its health, will contribute to its protection through additional gifts to the fund,” said Ruth Oppedahl, Natural Resources Foundation executive director.
For more information on contributing to, or establishing an endowment fund in Wisconsin, visit the Natural Resources Foundation website at WisConservation.org(exit DNR) or call toll-free 1-866-264-4096.
The Wisconsin River flows unimpeded by any man-made structures for 92 miles from the dam at Prairie Du Sac downstream to its mouth at the Mississippi River. Approximately 80,000 acres of land on both sides of the river have been designated as the Lower Wisconsin State Riverway.
