SIGURD OLSON ENVIRONMENTAL INSTITUTE: Comprehensive Mgmt Planning for O'Brien Lake

Sigurd Olson Environmental Institute at Northland College is sponsoring a large scale lake planning grant to study O\2019Brien Lake, in Iron County. The project will focus on developing a Lake Management Plan (LMP) for O\2019Brien Lake.

Project activities include: 1) Stakeholder participation \2013 stakeholder survey, planning meetings (2-4), kick-off meeting, wrap-up meeting, news release(s), and newsletter article; 2) Summarize ongoing lake management work; 3) Water quality sampling and analysis; 4) Watershed assessment and nutrient load modeling; 5) Characterize groundwater chemistry; 6) Characterize biological communities and ecosystem interactions; 7) Shoreline assessment and summarize existing fisheries data; 8) Aquatic plant surveys (PI survey, community mapping, and substrate mapping); 9) Data analysis; 10) Develop LMP.

Project deliverables include: 1) Stakeholder survey, news release(s), and newsletter article; 2) Water chemistry and ground water data; 3) Watershed maps and modeling data; 4) PI and shoreland data; 5) Aquatic plant community and substrate maps; 6) Aquatic plant vouchers; 7) LMP.

Specific conditions for this project: 1) Draft of stakeholder survey needs to be submitted to Lakes Management Coordinator for review and approval before sending to public; 2) Draft of LMP needs Dept review and approval.

WDNR Lakes Management Coordinator will be provided with an electronic (pdf or word) copy of LMP, news release(s), newsletter article, stakeholder survey, data from PI survey, shoreland assessment, groundwater assessment, watershed assessment and water quality sampling, all maps from project, all GIS data, and aquatic plant vouchers.

Final Report and Products

• Comprehensive Management Plan for Eleven Lakes in the Penokee Hills of Ashland and Iron Co., Wisconsin [PDF 11 MB]