Works

This section of the FNLC Website includes articles detailing some of our works (including printable PDFs). Our successes have come about with the support of our many partners.

The recent reports from our Executive Director provide good information about the projects that we are working on.

PDF Copies of Articles

• Steps to Cleaning Up Lake Champlain
  
• Great Waters and Lake Champlain
  
• Cover Cropping the Rock and the Bay
• Clean Lake, Dirty Lake? Business Alliance for a Clean Lake

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STEPS TO CLEANING UP LAKE CHAMPLAIN

The Choiniere Farm
April 17, 2010


Lake Champlain is a magnificent economic, social and natural resource, yet parts of the lake are plagued with pollution coming from urban/suburban land and from agricultural land. What actions will clean it up?

These photos provide an example. The aerial photo is the Choiniere farm in Highgate, Vermont in the 1980’s. As was common for that era, the cows have eroded the steep bank between the barn and the Rock River, shown in the bottom of the photo.

With every rainfall more sediment and more nutrients were washed off the hillside and into the river. The cows were allowed in the river, where they made “direct deposits” to the waterway. Manure from the barnyard and from around the barn washed into the roadside ditch or directly into the river. Eventually most of these sediments and nutrients wound up in Lake Champlain.

Over the years Guy and Henry Choiniere have made many improvements and have greatly reduced the pollution coming from their farm. Their actions offer an example of the improvements that are being made on many farms throughout the Champlain Valley.

Steps taken by the Choinieres serve to improve water quality, soil quality, animal comfort, farm cleanliness, nutrient management and farm profitability. Technical and funding supports have come from the US and Vermont Departments of Agriculture, US Fish and Wildlife, Vt. Agency of Natural Resources, and local non-profit organizations. These are some of their projects:

- Fence cows out of the streams, and install watering systems in the pastures.

- Plant 4,000 trees on the farm, along the river and side-streams, to stabilize the banks and shade the river. Missisquoi River Basin Association provided volunteer labor.

- Use roof gutters and other practices around the barn to keep clean water clean, and to separate clean water from dirty water.

- Direct dirty barnyard water into the manure pit.

- Build a “covered barnyard” and construct cattle lanes- to keep cows clean and to reduce the amount of dirty water.

- Next, making improvements in the fields---

- Work with a crop specialist to develop a nutrient management plan, providing manure and nutrient recommendations. Following this plan leads to improvements in water and soil quality, and a more economical use of nutrients.

- Establish a crop rotation for corn and hay that improves water and soil quality and reduces the need for fertilizer.

- Use manure injection, which reduces loss of nitrogen to the atmosphere. Nitrogen is a costly nutrient necessary for plant growth.

- Use covercrops to reduce erosion off of corn land in the winter/spring and to build better soil health, with support from Friends of Northern Lake Champlain.

- The Choinieres have made numerous other smaller changes in the farm structures and in their practices.


The results are visible in the photo taken in 2009, located at the end of this article. That photo shows river banks that are completely vegetated, a graveled cattle lane in the foreground and the big white covered barnyard in the background. The barnyard production areas do not allow dirty water to enter the river. The changes in field practices are just as important, though not visible here.

Guy and Henry Choiniere have invested much time, energy and money to make huge improvements in water quality on their farm, with other benefits being improved soil quality, increased animal comfort and better farm profitability.

So where is the magic bullet that cleans up Lake Champlain? There isn’t one. Cleaning up Lake Champlain will require a multitude of actions by farmers, businesses, state government, municipalities and every citizen.

We all contribute to the pollution of Vermont’s waters, none of us can point fingers. And we all need to take action, as the Choinieres have. Talking about the problems doesn’t solve them -- implementation projects and direct action are what will make the changes in water quality that will restore Lake Champlain, so that it is swimmable in all parts of the Lake, all summer long.

Friends of Northern Lake Champlain is a non-profit organization that works with farmers, businesses, citizens and government in the efforts to clean up Lake Champlain. www.northernlakechamplain.org/index.html


Paul Madden
Friends of Northern Lake Champlain
April 17, 2010

COVER CROPPING THE ROCK AND THE BAY  

Friends of Northern Lake Champlain has just received two state grants totaling $95,000 that will help to improve water quality in the Northern Lake through the introduction/demonstration of new agricultural field practices in the Rock River watershed and St. Albans Bay watershed.

Rock River is a small river flowing through Franklin, Highgate and two towns in Quebec; it is the most phosphorus-polluted waterway of any river in the Champlain basin. Phosphorus contributes to accelerated plant and algae growth and can lead to the explosive growth of blue-green algae blooms, which foul the water, and can even be poisonous. St. Albans Bay also is plagued with high levels of phosphorus in the four major streams that empty into the Bay. Both areas are intensively farmed with a high percentage of corn crops.

Corn land has been shown to be a major contributor to sediment and phosphorus pollution because the land is un-vegetated for 8 months of the year, and is thus vulnerable to erosion caused by rain and by snowmelt. In the Rock River watershed, much of this corn is grown on sloping land, which further contributes to erosion of soil and nutrients into the waterways.

For reducing sediment/phosphorus pollution from corn fields, covercrop is the practice that we believe delivers the best results for the dollar expended. When winter rye is planted immediately after corn harvest (late September/early October), the green growth protects the soil from erosion until spring corn planting (early May). In addition, there are benefits for soil nutrition, primarily the addition of nitrogen, which is a cost benefit to the farmer.

In the past two years we have done covercrop work in the Rock River watershed with grants from Agency of Natural Resources, and have successfully worked with 57% of the farmers in the watershed. Through these grants we pay ¾ of the cost of planting covercrop, with the farmer paying the remainder.

This fall, with grants from the Agency of Natural Resources and the AgAgency, we plan to support the planting of almost 1,700 acres of covercrop in corn land in Rock River and St. Albans Bay watersheds. In addition, in the spring we will work on reducing the impact of “Critical Source Areas” by supporting the seeding of hay crop in the gullies and heavy water-flow areas of corn fields. Critical Source Areas typically cover 20% of the land in a watershed but produce 80% of the pollution. So we are going to tackle those areas, and get the biggest bang for the buck.

Farmers in Rock River and St. Albans Bay watersheds interested in participating in this program should please call Brian Jerose, the contractor for Friends of Northern Lake Champlain. His phone number is 933-8336. This is a first come-first served program, so call soon.


Paul Madden
Executive Director
Friends of Northern Lake Champlain
Sept. 19, 2009

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CLEAN LAKE, DIRTY LAKE ?
BUSINESS ALLIANCE FOR A CLEAN LAKE

Lake Champlain has a powerful effect on the businesses around the northern Lake. A clean Lake attracts people from surrounding towns, from other states and from other countries. A dirty Lake will keep people away from the area and from local businesses. Even the reputation of being a dirty Lake will keep people away. This has been a good year for the northern Lake, with very few algae blooms, but last year was a bad year. So how does that affect the Lake’s reputation? Not well.

Most every business of any size that is anywhere near the Lake is impacted by the Lake to some extent-- lumber yards, building contractors, landscapers, house cleaners, restaurants, drug stores, quick-stops, bait shops, boutiques, bars, etc. Every extra customer that is in the area helps businesses to prosper. Businesses can’t afford a dirty Lake.

Our organization, Friends of Northern Lake Champlain, wants to have a clean Lake as well, and we are working with three regional Chambers of Commerce, business groups, environmental groups and others to create the Business Alliance for a Clean Lake. Together we will be able to exert more clean-Lake pressure upon the Administration, the Legislature and the media.

Northern Lake Champlain is a vital economic, social and natural resource, but over time it has been allowed to become too polluted, and it is up to all of us to make it clean again. Businesses have an important role to play, as do the citizen-led environmental groups. Business Alliance for a Clean Lake is working to bring greater focus to the effort to clean up Lake Champlain, with the intent of having businesses become more involved in the work to clean up this economic engine.


Paul Madden
Executive Director
Friends of Northern Lake Champlain
Sept. 19, 2009

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