Langford Creek Lake - A lack of habitat management...

Across the state highway from where I live is Langford Creek Lake, a small city lake that has been mismanaged for at least the 7 years that I have lived here... both for people and for wildlife. From the pictures here you can see that the area surrounding the lake is a naturally diverse ecological area that has been stripped of much of it's native vegetation and supplanted with tall fescue over most of the landscape. I have expressed my opinion on tall fescue in earlier posts so I won't go into it here. Suffice it to say it's only functional use here is as erosional control, and there are other choices that would be much better wildlife habitat.

Looking Northwest

The fescue covers most of the acreage on the property aside from a strip of wooded area along the north-eastern side of the lake and a small wooded area in the northwestern corner. This fescue includes two softball fields, a couple of poorly kept soccer fields, an area surrounding an old tennis court, and across and below the dam to the other side of the lake. I'm not sure at this time how many acres there are on the property, but I would say 200 acres+, including the lake. A little more than half of the acreage is lake and the rest is split about equal between woods and grass.

The mayor of the city likes to keep things mowed as best she can with the fiscal problems she faces in today's economy. She says it costs $1500 every time the area is mowed, mainly due to the offset mower required to mow the steep dam.

She obtained a grant last year to have all the brush and trees removed from the above area and the dam (pictured below). Trees along the dam were quite tall and blocked the sun from much of the reed undergrowth, keeping it from growing very thick. There were trails along the dam's water edge where people had been fishing. It was a nice native habitat that provided shade for the fish, animals, and people using the area, but the tall trees blocked the view from the road along the top of the dam... so they had to be cut down. But they were not killed. The stumps were left cut off at ground level.

Looking Southwest

Today the shoots have grown back to about a 10' height. And since the sun shines all day on them now, the reeds are so thick you can't get to the water's edge (see picture). Wouldn't it have been better to have left the trees standing tall to shade the area and provide a natural habitat for the critters and shade for the fishermen... and saved the money wasted on an ill conceived project? Maybe just trimming the trees back so that the views would be preserved, at the same time shading the water's edge and preventing the thick growth of reeds.


Early successional growth the next season.



 As you can see the native vegetation will grow here if it is left alone to do it's thing, providing excellent habitat for wildlife. But it could certainly use some nudging in the right directions to utilize the landscape for the best benefit of wildlife.

And the people could still have their park and ball fields and tennis court... but with an excellent native habitat intertwined with nature trails instead of open fields of periodically mown tall fescue. My idea is to remove the tall fescue and develop, over time, a native habitat conducive to attracting all types of wildlife to the area. I won't go into all the steps here, but I thought about studying the area as I have time and subsequently posting my thoughts.

There was at one time, I'm told, deer and turkey in the area, along with other smaller birds and wildlife. But there is very little, if any, deer or turkey activity in the area at present. There is some waterfowl activity, but there could be much more. The total wildlife population would require considerable study, I'm sure, but the area certainly does not presently approach it's potential...

When I approached the mayor last year about the possibility of Edge Habitat providing the city with habitat management for the area surrounding the lake, I was told simply that there was no money for such things. She did take my card and said that she would talk to others about the issue, but I have never heard a word from it.

However, this week when I took these pictures, I spotted these trees and brush piles where someone had been trimming the brush from around the trees, and piling it (see pictures); removing what might be nesting cover. There was a guy there, who I had met before, who told me there was a mexican that had been cutting and piling the brush. Another one of the good mayor's beautification projects, I surmise. But there is no money for habitat restoration... I wonder if the mexican man is here legally? 

To me, the problem here is the same problem encountered on private land when discussing habitat management for wildlife. People think that it's a nice idea, but there is no money for it. But they want to keep it all neatly mowed so it looks nice, never thinking that they are robbing wildlife of their environment. It's a matter of priorities, don't you know... where the money goes...