RANGELEY – Through the summer, the Rangeley Lakes Heritage Trust initiated a new and extremely aggressive invasive shoreline patrol project that is being applauded around the state for its ingenuity and overall success.
It was staffed by almost 70 volunteers who patrolled seven lakes and ponds in the Rangeley region in search of native and invasive aquatic plants. The effort, coordinated by RLHT’s Rebecca Kurtz and summer resident Ellie White, is one of the largest shoreline patrol groups in Maine.
RLHT’s overall goal is to improve the region’s ability to protect itself from invasive aquatic plants like Eurasian Watermilfoil by increasing the number of eyes focused on its precious waters, Kurtz said. To that end RLHT sponsored a six-hour plant identification and survey workshop and recruited over 65 pairs of volunteer eyes.
Then White, Kurtz, and the volunteers spent an average of nine hours each collecting and identifying plants from their canoes, kayaks, and power boats. Lugging buckets, bags and coolers full of plants to RLHT, they all worked together to identify and map the location of each plant. Over the course of four weeks, volunteers and coordinators surveyed an estimated 70 miles of shoreline and found over 56 different species of native plants. The native plants are “good” because they provide important wildlife habitat while supporting Rangeley’s world class fishery. They serve as shelter for fish and insects as well as forage for waterfowl and mammals. So RLHT strongly discourages removing them for any reason, Kurtz said.
Fortunately, neither the volunteers nor project coordinators found any invasive plants, she added.
“This was a great relief because the cost of removing plants is incredibly high while the damage that they cause can be catastrophic,” Kurtz said. As an example, she noted that “the Moultonborough taxpayers on Winnipsaukee Lake have voted to raise their taxes by $1 million to fight a small local infestation.
“Unfortunately, despite their valiant and costly effort, these New Hampshire residents have watched their property values decline by nearly 40 percent,” Kurtz said. Similarly, according to White, “residents on Maine’s Lake Arrowhead have seen the assessed values of their waterfront homes decrease by 15 percent while the taxes on in-town homes have gone up to meet the budget shortfall.
RLHT is looking to expand the number of patrolled water bodies in 2012 by 50 percent. In addition to coordinating teams on Cupsuptic, Dodge Pond, Haley, Kennebago, Long, Mooselookmeguntic, Quimby and Rangeley Lake, RLHT expects to create teams on Gull, Loon, Round, and the Sandy River Ponds. The group is sponsoring another workshop in 2012 and is inviting everyone to attend, whether or not they live on a lake.
For more information about this project and what you can do to help out, please contact Kurtz at 864-7311 ext 5 or rkurtz@rlht.org. All ages are welcome and the training and support is free.
