The Free Press
Fri, May 16 2008
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This month about 700 fish will be stocked in Spring Lake.
It’s not the first year the Department of Natural Resources has stocked the pond in lower North Mankato, but it is the first time since the completion of the dredging project at the pond.
It wouldn’t be surprising to see some local residents waiting with baited hooks.
The community has watched the evolution of the pond in the city park during the last six years with much anticipation. Each of those six years, city trucks have been in the middle of the lake scooping out loads of muck. As in a total of 110,000 cubic yards of muck.
Removal of the sediment has transformed a pond that was a several inches to about a foot deep into a fishing hole with a maximum depth of 11 feet.
The city has changed how it handles storm-water runoff so the pond will not quickly refill with sediment. The storm drains are now encased in pipe so over-ground drainage won’t erode soil and carry dirt into the lake. In addition, the city constructed more catch basins that allow dirt to settle before the storm water is pumped out.
Some of those retention ponds also may attract at least some of the geese that populate Spring Lake — that’s the hope, anyway. Another way to keep the geese in check would be for the city to get rid of grassy areas and plant more trees in the park, many which were removed along the shoreline during the final year or so of the project.
The remaining component of the pond-improvement plan is to build a fishing pier. Funding for it is to come from a proposed local sales tax. The authorization is in both the Senate and House tax bills.
The city took a chance on this long-term dredging project, not exactly knowing how it would proceed if trucks got stuck in the muck.
The risk and the wait have been worth it. North Mankato now has a more usable park that was already considered a jewel in the area.
Now it has even more sparkle.
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