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INSIDEyour env~rO:nnl'enit Mark Johnson
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Erosion control projects
put golf ahead of the curve
Mark Johnson (mjohnson@gcsaa.org) is GCSAA's environmen-
tal programs specialist.
The finished product from an erosion control project at North
Shore CC in Northbrook, III.This is a pond just off the club's
15th hole. Photo courtesy of F. Dan Dinelli, CGCS
and interesting to talk about riparian forest types
and habitat for salmon spawning and rearing
with two people who operated a golf course. After
the introduction, I was amazed at what had been
accomplished to date, largely from thousands of
hours of volunteer labor."
Superintendents like F. Dan Dinelli, CGCS at
North Shore Country Club in Northbrook, Ill.,
have put erosion control and bank stabilization at
the top of their project lists not only for streams,
but for ponds as well. One of Dinelli's projects
involved extensive erosion control around several
of his course's ponds (pictured above). In his case
study, "Pond Improvements Provide Better Water
Quality and Habitat for Aquatic Life," which
can also be found at www.eifg.org, the 24-year
GCSAA member says, "North Shore Country
Club established a goal to improve water quality
and aesthetics of the water features on the course.
The improvements included bank stabilization
and revegetation for erosion control. Further
enhancements included the creation of habitat,
installation of aerators and the incorporation of
buffer areas for pollution control and improved
water quality."
Editor's note: Inside Your Environment will periodically present summaries of case studies
that are being featured on The Environmental Institute for Golf Web site. Visit www.eifg.org.
When images of a mountain stream come to
mind, it's easy to visualize pristine clear waters
bordered by pine trees with colorful, fish lurking
in the shadows.
But what would you do if that stream was in
your backyard and in imminent danger of be-
coming polluted by a large sewer line that could
easily become ruptured with the next heavy
Well, if you're Tony Lashier, CGCS at the
at The Mountain in Welches, Ore., you
get proactive and develop a stream restoration
plan that not only fixes the problem, but creates
additional aquatic habitat.
That's just what Lasher, a 14-year GCSAA
member, did after heavy rains caused localized
flooding along the SaLmon River, a designated
National Wild and Scenic River that run"s
through the course and is home to coho salmon,
Chinook salmon, winter steelhead and rainbow
trout. The flooding exposed a sewer line that
services his surrounding community and eroded
more than 100 linear feet of soil from the stream
bank, sending it into the river and adding to the
river's downstream sedimentation, a common
pollutant in waterways across the nation.
Lasher knew that an exposed sewerline along
a sensitive river like the Salmon was a disaster
waiting to happen. The 2000 National Water
Quality Inventory from the EPA identified bac-
teria, siltation and habitat alterations as the three
leading pollutants of waterways. If a major sewer
line such as the one exposed by the flooding were
to dump its contents into the Salmon River, the
pathogenic pollutant load would be tremendous,
not to mention the amount of sedimentation
caused by the erosion of the stream bank.
As a result, Lasher coordinated a signifi-
cant stream restoration project, which is the
highlighted case study in this month's "Green
Links," featured on The Environmental Insti-
tute for Golf's Web site at www.eifg.org. He
worked with natural resource agencies and local
governments to obtain grant monies.
Duane Bishop, a district fisheries biologist
with the U.S. Forest Service,worked with Lasher
and Ed Hooper, the owner of the resort, on this
project and says, "I thought it was both exciting
a-BASF
The Chemical Company
Presented in partnership
with BASF
The Na
Foundation recently
Russell Associates to
and executing two n
funded by Toyota and Th
Foundation. SRA will proVI e R~!
relations and creative services fal'
projects. One includes the coordina-
tion and promotion of 10 tree-planting
event celebrations, and the second
project involves The National Arbor
Day Foundation's poster contest in
which more than 75,000 fifth graders
nationwide partlcipate.in n
illustrate the imp
38 GeM April 2007