Conservation projects at Wisconsin’s Glacial Habitat Restoration Area & Crex Meadows/Fish Lake State Wildlife Areas
The Glacial Habitat Restoration Area (GHRA) in eastern Wisconsin and Crex Meadows and Fish Lake State Wildlife Areas in northwest Wisconsin offer important habitat for migratory waterfowl, shorebirds, songbirds and other wetland-dependent wildlife. These areas provide migration habitat for hundreds of thousands of waterfowl each year, while also providing critical nesting habitat primarily for mallards, blue-winged teal and wood ducks. However, a documented decline in wetland and grassland wildlife has resulted from large scale land use change in these areas. Since pre-settlement, Wisconsin has lost nearly 99 percent of its prairie and savannah and 50 percent of its wetlands. To help reverse these trends, Ducks Unlimited (DU) and the Wisconsin Department of Natural Resources (DNR) recently joined forces with Syngenta to combat weeds in preparation for restoration of native prairie within the GHRA and to control invasive woody vegetation in existing prairie at Crex Meadows and Fish Lake State Wildlife Areas. As part of a two year project, Syngenta has generously donated 620 gallons of Touchdown HiTech® herbicide valued at over $21,000. This donation will help DU and its partners restore and enhance native prairie favorable to grassland-nesting songbirds, pheasants and ducks.
This is the first year that Syngenta has supported DU projects in Wisconsin. Syngenta has supported DU projects in the US and Canada from coast to coast since 2003, and Syngenta’s product donations have earned them the DU Gold Teal Award. Their Wisconsin donation is part of DU’s national partnership with CropLife America, a trade association representing manufacturers and distributors of plant science solutions for agriculture and pest management in the U.S. Syngenta is a member of CropLife America and understands the value of their contributions to waterfowl conservation.
The GHRA was established in 1991 by the Wisconsin DNR and includes 24 townships within Winnebago, Fond du Lac, Dodge and Columbia counties in eastern Wisconsin. It consists of a mix of agricultural land, grasslands and wetlands, and is located in the historic center of Wisconsin’s premier duck range. The Wisconsin DNR plans to add up to 600 acres of land per year to the GHRA project. To date, the Wisconsin DNR and other project partners have restored 25,000 grassland acres and more than 6,900 wetland acres in the GHRA. A total of 592 acres of uplands will be treated to kill annual and perennial weeds as the first step in native prairie restoration. After treatment, these uplands will be drill-seeded with a diverse mix of native prairie grasses and forbs.
The Crex Meadows and Fish Lake State Wildlife Areas (SWAs) encompass over 44,000 acres of west central Burnett County. Both Crex Meadows and Fish Lake SWA have been identified as high-priority landscapes for grassland bird management by the Wisconsin DNR. In addition, this area, together with other nearby wildlife areas, has the largest remaining population of sharp-tailed grouse in Wisconsin. Crex Meadows has been designated a Globally Important Bird Area by the American Bird Conservancy. Mixed throughout the large native grassland, pine/oak barrens, and shrubland communities of Crex Meadows and Fish Lake are more than 20,000 acres of shallow water flowages and sedge meadow. During migration, these wetlands host thousands of staging waterfowl and sandhill cranes.
Pine/oak barrens are considered globally rare habitat types and this project area has been identified as one of the premiere locations for restoring pine/oak barrens at a landscape scale. Over the next two years, the Wisconsin DNR will apply Touchdown HiTech® herbicide to invasive woody vegetation on 400 acres of native prairie and pine/oak barrens at Crex Meadows and Fish Lake SWA. Annual herbicide application to control invasive woody vegetation will be critical to promoting native prairie and pine/oak barren diversity in these wildlife areas.